Is there an Alsation naming style?

Question

So, I've poked around a bit, and I can't seem to find an answer, so I thought I'd try a crowd sourcing approach!

I have several ancestor from the Alsace Lorraine region of France (Present day Bas-Rhin, Haut-Rhin and Moselle), and their native language would have been francique and alsation, both of which are Germanic dialects.I am therefore unsure about what form of their name I should use. In the case of after civil registrations, I have early civil documents in German with German forms of the names, later civil records in French with French names, and German records and names again after Germany took over the region in 1877 (sometimes all for the same person). And before that, I have church records in Latin, where, if they were able, they might have signed their name in either a German or a Latin form.

My question is, therefore, is first, if there a way I can show both a French and a German form for the ancestors who appear both ways in civil records? And second, is there a preferred form for pre-civil records for this region?

Personally, I use the German forms for anything earlier than civil registration in my own genealogy software, but I'm worried that using German forms here might lead to duplicate profiles for people who say, oh, they're French, and then use the French form of the name.

Thanks for the help!

Answer 1

I don't think we will ever get around the problem of LNAB in different languages. And in Alsace I believe there has always been a mix of French and German. But in your case it seems to be more German. I probably would go with the German LNAB and all the others in the other last name field per Name_Fields_for_European_Aristocrats 

I've been lucky, my Alsation family kept the same name in Germany, France and the U.S. 

Good luck in your Alsation hunt.

Comments

Thank you, Richard.

The last names seem pretty consistent (or at least as consistent as can be expected with people who don't care that much about spelling. I should probably clarify that I'm wondering more about personal names. So, Peter versus Pierre or Anna Maria versus Anne Marie.

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Just a note - the guidelines that Richard mentions above re: European Aristocrats indicate that the Proper First Name "should be one word only" (item 2). While that may be the case for profiles associated with the European Aristocrats Project, I don't believe that holds true for all profiles. There are many countries that don't have a distinction of a "middle" name. In those cases, it is my understanding that multiple given names documented on a birth or baptismal record should all be included in the Proper First Name field in their native language and the "no middle name" radio button should be checked.

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Thanks Rick, I agree, and this is the style recommended by the French Roots project (put all names given at baptism or civil registration in the Proper First Name field). I am not aware of a specific guideline from the German Roots project, but from several discussions I conclude they have no "middle name" concept in Germany either.

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Thanks Isabelle - as you mentioned, there have been prior discussions regarding given/first/middle names. Here's a prior G2G post on the topic. I've been using that guidance when working on profiles associated with the French Roots and German Roots projects.

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Thank you for the input! I've created the profiles for three people: Filser-8, Filser-9 and Winter-4363. I've entered the name given at their birth registration for the Proper First Name Field and then used the other form of their name that shows up in civil and church records in the Preferred First Name Field. So, for Peter Filser, "Peter" in the first field and "Pierre" for the second (since that is the form on his three marriage records.) And I've taken your advice for the "Anna Maria" and "Anne Marie" in entering the whole form in the name field.