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My Naming Practices
Anyone who's done research into their French-Canadian ancestry knows that the naming conventions are somewhat unique, generally owing to the small number of original settlers and the ensuing large family sizes. What ended up happening is that there would be several people living at the same time in the same area, all with the same name.
'DIT' NAMES
To help alleviate this problem, they would give people a form of nickname
that could be based on any one of a number of sources: Where the person was
from, what their occupation was, if they were the 'younger' one with that name
or the 'older' one, and so on. These nicknames are called "Dit" names, because
the word 'dit' means 'called' in French, as in, "Catherine (called LeJeune)
Joseph". I put these Dit names in parentheses within the name, as in the example
just shown.
DUPLICATE NAMES
Despite the practice of using "Dit" names, many of my ancestors who gave their
children similar names through succeeding generations are difficult to tell
apart in a long list of names. Thus, a Jean-Baptiste might name his son Jean-Baptiste,
who might also name his son Jean-Baptiste. Also, most of these families have 6
or more children, so there end up being a great many people with the same name.
To cut down on the confusion I've added short descriptions in parentheses within
some people's name which help establish how a person relates to other
individuals within the family tree. In these cases, I tend to use French terms,
so I will show examples in both French and English.
| Jean (grandpere)
Baillargeon Jean (pere) Baillargeon Jean (fils) Baillargeon |
Jean (grandfather)
Baillargeon Jean (father) Baillargeon Jean (son) Baillargeon |
| When succeeding
generations are named the same I use the words 'grandfather', 'father', and 'son'. |
|
| Anne (fille de Francois)
Brun Charles (fils d'Antoine) Brun |
Anne (daughter of Francois)
Brun Charles (son of Antoine) Brun |
| When siblings and
children of siblings are hard to tell apart I use 'daughter of' and 'son of'. |
|
| Vincent (pere de Sebastien) Brun | Vincent (father of Sebastien) Brun |
| Occasionally using 'father of' is the more appropriate designation to make things clearer. | |
ACCENTS
I have elected to leave out accents for purely selfish reasons. Accented names
sort differently in the Family Tree Maker program than unaccented names, and
until I take the time to go through the entire list and rename everyone, I'll be
leaving the accents off of most names.
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