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Old December 27, 2008   #11
ContainerTed
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Join Date: Jul 2008
Location: 6a - NE Tennessee
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When I was stationed in England, I did a lot a work on tracing the family tree. I kept wondering why I saw male children being born to a family and then the last name would be changed or modified in successive generations. Females, when getting married, might take on both last names with a hyphen (i.e. Smith-Martin).

While "havin' a pint" at a pub near Cambridge University, a gentleman nearby heard us talking and volunteered some info. Seems he was one of the experts and a professor specializing in Heraldry. He said that the changing of names and spellings was a french influence. The letter "I" would be replaced with "Y" and a simply "en" might become "enne" or "ienne". It was just fashionable to do so. The Smith-Martin above might become Smythe-Martyenne.

It made a lot of things that I had been seeing in Birth and Death registers and other church documents and books make sense. I had been seeing evidence of this practice going all the way back to the 12th century. It was "rampant" in the 15th-19th centuries timeframe, and went off the scale during the Victorian Era.

Maybe this might be a clue to help explain some of the spelling problems with Eggecombe to Edgecombe to Edgecumbe......etc.

Ted

BTW - I was continually surprised at what buying "a pint" or making a small (10 quid) donation to the vicar's "steeple rebuilding fund" would get you access to.
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Last edited by ContainerTed; December 27, 2008 at 06:58 PM.
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