Understanding colonial-era German names in genealogy: they're not the same as English names
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- čas přidán 25. 07. 2024
- If you have any ethnic German ancestors from the 1600s to the early 1800s, you may wonder why so many of them are named Johann or Johanna. Or perhaps you have a pair of records that you’re convinced are for the same person, except that one is for Johann Peter Wagner, the other Hanes Peter Wagner.
Ethnic Germans from the 1600s to the early 1800s had different cultural conventions for naming than the naming traditions we mostly follow in the U.S. today. In this video, I’ll highlight some of the common ethnic German naming conventions from that time period that can be confusing today.
1) People were typically known by their middle name, not their first name.
2) The names Johann and Johanna had multiple forms used interchangeably in documents.
3) The letters “in” might be added to the end of women’s surnames.
4) If a child died, parents might give a newborn the same name. - Jak na to + styl
All that you mention here I've seen during my research on german ancestors. Great and practical video!
Very informative. Quite by accident my oldest sister was named Ingrid Margaret by my German descended mother but my sister preferred Margaret and has always gone by this name. Margaret is a saint's name. Her story fits but all by coincidence.
Excellent information and video. Thank you very much for clarifying this subject. Blessings
Very helpful for me. My mother's side is mostly German and my great grandfathers all have the "Johann" before their name. This explains how children in one family end up with the same name, too.
I appreciated your comment about the first name not being the name they were known by, this reminder helped me this morning.
I might add that I have relatives that are brothers with the same long name and different birth dates. It does not mean one died, it just means they had the same witnesses to their baptism. The both grew up and immigrated to the US. One went by one of the middle names and his brother went by a different middle name.
This was helpful for me, trying to unscramble records for my German ancestors. Thanks.
Thank you! This was so helpful in understanding my German ancestry. I do have a lot of Johann's and Johanne/johanna's and those who went by middle names.
I'm in the middle of a one place study for a small Lutheran (evangalische) church in a rural area of Wisconsin, USA. The church and most of it's congregation used the German language well into the 1900s. Right now, I'm transcribing and working with a church record book that spans 1871-1903, and while I certainly am learning about the genealogy of the different families, I'm also learning a lot more general lessons, about more than just the art of reading handwriting in the old German.
Mainly, that different families had wildly different naming conventions. Some seemed to use only one name (no middle name) for their children. Some used three names for the boys but only two for the girls. Most used three, or rarely, four, for all their children.
Some continued with their old country naming patterns well into the 1900s. Some switched to American patterns shortly after arriving in the new country.
My own family belonged to the church. They consistently used three names all along, but the older kids were called by their third name, while the ones born in the USA were nearly immediately called by their first name.
Another lesson is that then, like now, fashion played a huge part in names. It seemed like every year ot two, the fashionable names changed and about half the babies got those fashionable names.
Some families had crowds for the baptismal sponsors, others just one or two sponsors. Most seemed to choose three sponsors. For boys, mostly two men and one woman. For girls, usually two women and one man. By far, it's most common that the sponsors have "call" names that match the child's given names.
When they changed over to being known by Americanized versions of their names, some stuck fairly close to their original given names (Carl/Charles, Wilhelm/William), or Ludwig/Louis). Others went in a completely different direction and just chose names they liked better.
I'd like to also say that I regularly wish I could go back in time to lecture the pastors about the importance of decent attention to the information they put in the records, not to mention their handwriting and ink choices. Yikes!
The practice of using the same name again after the first child died is common in many cultures. My grandfather in law was the second Cyril in his family which were of Cornish descent. Sometimes a combination of names are used. It isn't uncommon even now to be name after a relative that passed away.
Very helpful !! Thank you so much !
The reusing of a dead child's name was very common in other cultures, too.
One of my maternal great-grandparents had the same name as a brother of his, born 20 years earlier but who had died in infancy.
The most extreme case I found was an ancestor of mine who had 5 siblings named Maria; the name was reused over and over, because each girl was born after the previous one had died.
(I'm from Portugal.)
I've 2 or 3 but never 5
Thank for this very helpful video :)
So this might explain why all my grandfather's siblings had a saint/Bible name as their first name. One was actually named Christian. The only daughter was named Anna, while all the 8 brothers had names like Jacob, Joseph, Benjamin, Peter, Emanuel. Thanks for the info, new subscriber here.
Fascinating! I'm learning more about my German last name Singer!
Enjoyed this clip , many of my ancestors name is Johann and Maria form Heppenheim area .
That's super interesting, reusing the name of a deceased child probably goes back to the same tradition as naming children after ancestors, you're inviting a piece of that spirit back to reincarnate. In this case, you're holding the door open twice.
You know, I've read a lot about necronyms, but never thought about the "why" of it. You've got an intriguing hypothesis there. Thanks!
When my German grand-mother-in-law was rushed to the hospital, they called and said we have your grandma Ana Brunner. I said, she's not my grand-mother-in-law. They called back with the name we knew her by. The same with my mother. Both known by their middle names. I'm glad we don't do that today.
On target! My German 2nd g-grandfather was born Johan Joseph Nickel but in America was Joseph J. Nickel.
My Dutch side had a similar naming system; Germanic names, but English naming system. My Grandfathers (Opa's) full name was Gijsbertus Johannes Vergeer. He had several brothers born after him with varying family names than the name Michaël. So it goes several different ways of naming someone a Middle Name depending on the area.
I liked watching your channel. I am an American with British & German ancestry. Also Colonial America is a part of my heritage. Also all of my life I have belonged to a Christian sect where geneology is a part of our religion.
Very helpful. I assume that Anna was also considered a common name and though I have spent my last 24 hours going through 150 pages of long-form non-indexed birth records I may have already found what I was looking for. My Catharina Frosch was recorded as Anna Catharina Frosch and my Elizabeth Zimmer was recorded as Maria Elizabeth Zimmer. (good thing I made a note of the records as I went by...!)
@@first-timediy9990 Thanks!
And of course, I was on the wrong account. Reposting so I can delete.
Anna and Johanna are often interchangeable. So yes, Anna is going to be all over the place, but you'll sometimes see the same person with, say, Anna Catharina and Johanna Catharina.
Thank you. You have solved a family mystery.
I've noticed this a lot in my genealogical research, where I see the same name twice.
Yes, I DID enjoy this. Thumbs up and a subscribe. :-) Based on this video alone, you seriously deserve more subs. This is my genealogy channel, but I also subbed on my art channel. So two subs for you. :-)
My 6th great grandparents recycled several names. We call them Robert 1 and 2, etc
Interesting!
Wilkepleck was anglicized to Wills in my family and were thrown out of Switzerland. Also my dad was called by his middle name.
I often run into all the boys having the father's first name as their first name, but different middle names. Was this common.
RAU surname anglicized to ROWE in the US. Still rhymes with cow, which causes problems with the English Rowes "roe".
My grandfather found a lot of Konradt's when going through old records
Mike , I believe we have played genealogical ping pong on ancestry with the Schlauch/ Slough family. I'm a Slough descendant, for the record a Slough cousin was recently accepted into the Sons of the American Revolution through Bernard Slough (1757-1823) s/o Johann Jacob, g/s of Ernst Bernard. Northampton and Cumberland/Perry Co., Pa., this my line also. I'll email your website
My Dad’s name was Klaus Magnus Staeben born Latvia, as Baltic German. What can you tell me about the name Staeben. (Stáben)
If anyone needs help with any German documents, get in touch with me. I am half English half German and I am interested in historical documents. Always happy to help.
Nice to offer.
The necronyms are common in British & Irish as well
Most enjoyable. Working on the name Renneker. Great grand dad came to US in 1842 but don’t have any German references. Any help?
Renneker is most likely a dialectical corruption of the first name Reinhart. There are many more, i.e. Reinecke, Reincke, Reineker, Renken. All of these are diminutives at the same time, so they refer to "Little Reinhart". Moreover, Renneker seems to be an attribution: "belonging to little Reinhart".
The name Renneker is not very common. Apart from a few Rennekers living in big cities all across the country, there is a striking occurrence in just one rural area, called Sauerland. In fact, the name fits into Sauerländer Low German. If I were to start a Renneker family research from scratch, that would be my place to begin.
Unfortunately, I can't post a link to the map showing the occurrence of the name here. You can find the source on legacy.stoepel.net+en?name=Renneker after replacing the + with /.
What about Gruber that was my grandma on my dad's side
thomas jeferson graybeal documented an shared/published our krayenbuhl,kraybill, etc. now graybeal. bern 1497.
The names that end with ______enberger ? They designate the place (town -- village) you're from?
Not ?
Johann Fredrich Sponheimer - My 6th generation Grandfather…
Lunenberg Nova Scotia Records ?.. 0:15 0:15 0:15
My husband's family is all Johanns and Marias back to the 1600's and drove me crazy for awhile until I figured it out, but none of my side of Germans follow that (that I'm aware of) my Germans are from Prussia, does that naming issue not pertain to Prussian Germans?
My father always told us we were of Prussian German decent but I know nothing of my grandfather. He disappears.
@@josephdeffendoll3056 They are tricky to find, but you can find them. You will have to try many different spellings. Some of my family are Miller...in Prussian records I've seen my family as Mueller, Muller, Moeller. Even my husband's family has at least six different spellings.
@@josephdeffendoll3056 you may have to try obscure spellings such as Diephendahl, Difendahl, etc Yes, the names can be spelled that different.
@@CindyinLenexa Or Tiefental - which would be the standard German version (meaning ‚deep valley‘)
@@CindyinLenexa Mueller, Muller, Moeller...surname in my family tree that came to New Netherland in 1709 during the Great Palatine Immigration. They settled in Dutchess Co., NY...
What does hinz mean
In Niederdeutsch(northern German dialect family) Hinz= Heinz =Heinrich.
One thing you did not mention is that Catholic and Protestants used different naming conventions, with Catholic names usually being longer (4 or more names), etc.
this isn't at all the case in Germany nowadays, haven't meet any German who has this. It is however common in Scandinavia.
My mom’s first name was spelled as Joanna (Joan) not Johanna….
Funny you mention Johann Wagner. I have an ancestor with that name 😆
Same. Wagner is very common. It's the 3rd common name in Austria for example
Why 4 names? August Eberhard Maximilian Beverforden (2nd great-grandfather, Bramsche, Hannover) This line uses 4 names consistently.
There's definitely some timeframe things here. I know when I get into the 1500s and early 1600s in the Baden-Wurttemberg area, the three-name convention I described became rarer, while in the mid-1800s, a fourth name started to crop up.
I don't actually have a good answer for you, though. Culture, I guess. There's always exception. That said, I have a vague recollection of a book that may have touched on this. I'll take a look.
@@five-minutegenealogy1119 In my family tree, the multiple names are because of the baptismal sponsors. My Great Grandfather is Herman Johann Cord Deitrich Stockman. The middle names are his sponsors
Iwona
German on both sides my last name is German knapp
Ah ha! Who knew?!
So explained how my black family members in Barbados got Mayers as surname doing the research something doesn’t add up
I'm sorry to say this, but many of the informations in this video are precarious. It's untrue, that a German middle name is the normally used name in general.
There is a difference between "Anna" and "Johanna". These are usually not the same.
Family names ending with "-in" and sometimes "-lin" often originated near the Baltic Sea. They are a legacy of the Slavic origin of these German areas. (Buddin, Bochin, Penzlin,...)
Similar names, all ending with "-lin" are diminutives originally from Swabia. (Märklin, Ensslin, Hölderlin,...)
Names like these are not of "feminine gender", all members of the family bear them equally.
Female endings, added to full family names (Müller and his Müllerin) may have been a custom in some regions, but they weren't a rule.
I have read many German church records and the further back one goes, the "rules" explained in this video are more true than not. I have seen where all the males were named Johannes in a family and all females were named Anna. They did go by their middle names later in life and in records to be differentiated between their siblings. No one ever follows the rules completely and I have found that starting around 1700's when the Palatine Germans were flooding into British America these naming practices did start to disappear more and more. The video is referring to practices that were used in Colonial times...
Heidenreich
Need help last Name Whittmore
It might have derived from Wittmer ot Witmer or Witwer
That's a place in Ostfriesland as well.
How about " Seipelt" ? What does it mean???