Wednesday, February 09, 2011

What's In A Name?

Have you visited Siobhan lately to see how she honored her husband's ancestor Honoria by stitching her name on a sampler? 

I've been doing some genealogy lately--it may be that the family legend that the Senecals were run out of Rouen for being horse thieves turns out to be true--and I've been collecting some family names. The women's names are good: Euphrosine  (fourth great grandfather's half sister), Philemise (great great grandmother), Philomene (third great grandmother), Albina (another great great grandmother),  Mestai (Philemise's sister), Petronille, Harmeline.

But the men's names! Oh, the men's names: Exise (Philemise's Brother), Euclide (grandmother's uncle), Napoleon (great grandfather), Magliore, Nazaire. My mother's great uncle Desire (de ZEER) may be my favorite though. (It sounds better when you remember he was of French descent.)

These are names that belong on samplers. I'd better get to work!

4 comments:

xeyedmary said...

Well, we now have more in common: my father passed on the Murphy family legend that our line was kicked out of Ireland for being horse thieves and ended up in Candada! My mom's geneaology makes the legend plausible.
I love your family names! We have a plethora of Charleses, Philips and Jameses, and a Sylvester (?) and Marys and Elizabeths. Very boring...

Alice said...

Those are great names! There are more than a few of them in my family... Napoleon and Albina I actually remember. I also have an uncle Romeo... Isn't genealogy fun?

MelissaD said...

My dad's family left France for Quebec in the 1600s and several generations later were part of the deportation of the Acadians. They eventually ended up in the US and shortened the family name but some of the first names are lovely. We have Pierre, Etienne, Semmeria and Emilien on the male side and Leona, Marguerite, Madeleine and Francoise on the womens' side. I love your idea of incorporating old family names into a sampler - you have started something in my brain :)

Siobhán said...

I'm still insanely jealous of your family names. I'm behind on commenting so see that your Maggie is actually Marguerite--that was my grandmother's name, too. Her maiden name was McAllister--too long to stick on a sampler, but I'm still trying to find one that will work.