What’s in a name?

Family Searcher
by Nina Brawn

    Names can be a tricky thing when doing genealogy, so it helps to know a little about the names and the naming traditions in your country of origin. It also helps to understand name meanings in the native language.
    Until the last several hundred years, many people did not have surnames. Villages were small and travel was difficult so everyone knew everyone else in a village. As villages grew, we needed ways to distinguish say, between one John and another. We chose a feature most people would know them by and attached that description to their name — they were known by a physical feature, who their father was, the job they performed, where they lived at the time, or where they came from.

    These descriptions became surnames: (to distinguish the family of John with the black hair from John with the red hair) thus the Black family and the (Red) Reed family was born. The man who made your wagons and carts became John Cartwright, the man from Wales became John Walsh, the man who lived near the bridge became John Briggs. When William The Conqueror needed to be better liked, he was called William Of Normandy, because he came from Normandy, France. This made him a much nicer guy, I’m sure!
    Being named after one’s father led to the Johnsons, the Nelsons, Davidsons even Carlsdotter; so in Sweden the son of Nels became Nelson. The Icelandic daughter of Carl became Carlsdotter. Knowing that “Schultz” is a German word for “black” may explain why the family became the Blacks after they moved to America. And forget the rumor that people were forced to take new names on Ellis Island. That has never proved to be true. Perhaps it was a convenient excuse to give the family left behind in the “old country.” However, passenger lists were made out at the Port of Departure so there would have been no difficulty with the names in their native land and the passenger lists were used by the customs agents in New York. Certainly many immigrants or their children may have Americanized their names after arrival, immediately or in later years.
    The other issue is that spelling was not consistent until around the 1700s. Not just names, but all words were spelled the way the person who knew how to write thought they should be spelled.
    We did not use “legal names” until fairly recently in history, so people used the name they wanted to use and spelled it the way they wanted to spell it.
    And families changed spellings willy-nilly. Not wanting to be associated with the Salem Witch persecuting Hathornes in his family, author Nathaniel changed his surname’s spelling to Hawthorne. As a Brawn, I am now related to the Brawns, Browns, Branns, Brauns … well you get the idea. Spelling is flexible so you must be as well.
    This does not even begin to address the issues of naming traditions with first names. Just remember a rose by any other name would still smell as sweet …
    Nina G. Brawn has lived in the Dover-Foxcroft area for over 50 years and currently lives there with her husband Fred. Nina was the last of 10 children, has three children of her own and nine grandchildren. She can be reached online at ninagbrawn@gmail.com.