The Name Game
You'll sometimes hear someone say "We're the Macdonalds with a small d", or "It's Laurie with a u", especially if it's to say "So we can't be related". This is misguided. Names weren't written consistently in the past, especially when people were illiterate, as they couldn't tell the registrar or church clerk how to spell their name. It would be registered with whatever spelling the writer thought was closest. Walter Lourie married Frances Finlayson in 1836 but in the 1841 census he was Walter Lawrie and in the 1851 census he was Walter Laurie. He is clearly the same person, given other evidence, but being too strict in searches would have caused his records to be overlooked.
This does cause problems as the case of Honeyman Old/Oal illustrates. We had been looking for alternative spelling such as Olde or Auld but never imagined that Old was an Anglified spelling of the name he brought down from Caithness. It's easily seen going forward but a problem trying to trace back. I have stated elsewhere that the person with the biggest gaps in her records is Mary Ann Lawrence in my wife Sandra's tree. It isn't helped by the fact that she is variously listed as Maryann or Laurence or Lawrance or any other variations. There are sometimes wildcard search options but searching for Mary* brings up all Marys and Marybetts and all sorts of other irrelevant options, clouding the waters.
Talking of waters, my great-great-great-grandmother Janet Waters was also Jean and Jane and Watters, Walter and Walters and every combination of those. It's easy enough to see those forenames as being interchangeable but I didn't initially know that Donald and Daniel are as well and even Isabella and Elizabeth! One major problem with all this is that widening the net to catch all variations also lets in all sorts of irrelevant options.
Possibly the best example of the variations which can exist is Elder Samuel's mother who is Kathrine, Katherine, Cathrine and Catherine, even Keteren and Moutree, Moutrie, Moutries, Muttries, Mutries, Multrie and Mutrie in the Old Parish Records. Every time a child was registered a new variation entered the books.
Just to add a punchline, she is McMutries in Elder's death notice.
Talking of Elder brings us to another aspect of naming. Scottish families traditionally followed a naming pattern as shown below.
- first boy - paternal grandfather
- second boy - maternal grandfather
- third boy - father
- first girl - maternal grandmother
- second girl - paternal grandmother
- third girl - mother
- any other child - other as yet unused family names
It wasn't always strictly followed and often if a parent and grandparent or both grandparents had the same name it couldn't be used a second time but it has been incredibly useful to distinguish correct lines to follow in this research, often confirmed by subsequent evidence.
Of course if a farmer named Robert Burns had five sons who all stayed in the village and all had a son, they should all be named Robert Burns. I'm sure this is why there are so many colloquial variations on some names. Robert, Rab, Rabbie, Bob, Bobby, Rob, Robbie and Robin could all be distinguished from each other in everyday life but all be registered as Robert. That makes it difficult for us. Interestingly, there were so many people with the same combination of first and second names in Ross-shire (usually Ross!) that nicknames were entered into the records.
Very occasionally the surname of a family friend or other aquaintance may have been used as the Christian name of a child. This seems to have been the case with Honeyman Old as Ephan Honeyman was living at Thura at the time he was born. Similarly Elder is a Corstorphine surname and may have been the source of Elder Samuel's name when she was born there. Otherrwise I have no idea for its source. That these two should marry seems appropriate.
In a similar vein to people's names, placenames can be spelled in various ways. Roslin, Rosslyn and Roslyne are all the same place but searching for one might not find another. In addition, the records are probably stored under the name of the parish, which happens to be Lasswade in this case, so the researcher has to be aware of this and probably the neighbouring parishes as well given that a move of a short distance or a change in parish boundary could relocate the records as well.