I think a persons name reveals a lot about their background?

Question:I mean - the Surname gives a lot of information on the long term lineage of the familly, while the given names say a lot about the taste and class background of the immediate parents. True?

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: I mean - the Surname gives a lot of information on the long term lineage of the familly, while the given names say a lot about the taste and class background of the immediate parents. True?

The same surname frequently comes from more than one nationality. Also not everyone with the same surname are necessarily related, even those of the same national origin.

Unfortunately too many people in starting genealogy try to trace a surname and that leads them in the wrong direction. They get
taken advantage of by surname product peddlers which are on the internet, sold at shopping malls, airport and advertised in magazines.

See the link below from the National Genealogical Society.

http://www.ngsgenealogy.org/comconsumerp...

Given names run in fads. When I was a little girl Shirleys were everywhere because of Shirley Temple. However, I was named for a pretty little girl named Shirley and she was probably named for Shirley Temple.
My younger sister thought she was getting something unique back in 1970 when she named my niece Heather. Ha! now there are Heathers everywhere. Savannah is an old name that is making a comeback.

Kevin a uniquely Irish name wasn't used too much when I was growing up. Arthur Godfrey had Carmel Quinn on his show. They had a little boy from an orphanage named Kevin. After that Kevins started popping up everywhere. Now people can be named Kevin and have no Irish ancestry at all.

When we look at census records we often see names we laugh at. However, the day will come when people will probably laugh at Tiffany and Brittany and the like. Those were a couple of names that were unheard of until about 25 years ago.

But old standbys like John, Mary, William,
Elizabeth Joseph, Margaret etc. will always be with us. My preference for a girl is Catherine with a C. I had a great grandmother named Roxie Catherine and I love the name.

Yes, you probably can tell something about the age of a person with some names like Kimberly. That is a name that people didn't hear until the 60s. Heather for instance is an old name but it wasn't used in the U.S. until the 70s. A lot of Shirleys were born in the 30s and 40s. I was born in 1935.

The above poster is named Nicole. Nicole was a name unheard of in the U.S. until about 30 years or so ago.

Kimberly Lawrence- what do you think about me?

Surname reveals a certain amount of information, about origins but then u have to figure out how that connects to the person.

People tend to have fun with the given name.

"Kimberly" became very popular in the late 80s/early 90s a good guess would have been under 20

I think the purpose of my name was to make me seem as normal as possible considering my exotic looks- from an exotic background.

Slender? no... well i can fit into a size 1, but am more comfortable in 4. looks? up 4 interpretation

yea, unless they are a woman who's surname has changed after marriage or they change their name or something like that.

About the Kimberly thing, How the h can you tell someones age from their name??? Their name most likely stays the same their whole life...

Lol, I see how you can tell thier age.. lol, i feel stupid now sorry. But I don't think that age thing can be applied to everyone, it's not like every parent picks names that are popular at the time of thier kids birth.

Well, yeah. That's where a genealogy search starts.

I agree to some extent. Some names don't really reveal anything. For instances; my daughter's name is Tammy. You can't say much about her background! Some names however, do reveal things about their backgrounds. A friend of mine, name is Habah. That means true love. At least that's what she said!

well yeah but i really don't think a persons name reflects who there true personality is

Not really. My Irish ancestry hails from the O'Hannons. Over the years, the O' got dropped a few generations before my Mom. My German ancestry, Mionske, was an adopted one since my Father was adopted. So, am I even German at all?
As for my first name, My Mom didn't have a name picked out. she decided that what we looked like would be our name. My name is Carol. Song of Joy. Now, My Mom being Taurus the bull that is an unusual thing for a bull to do. Also, being an accountant, yes she has a thing for numbers and order and a system for everything, so, there was no system for selecting a name for me. Just what she "felt" I looked like.
In theory, what you say about name's telling about people would normally work under normal circumstances, but not in my case.

maybe 1 in 100, the rest would be a toss up.
for every famous person with a given name,(good person) you could probably find a serial killer with the same name.

There may be a problem...I was adopted by my step-father, and his father arrived on Ellis Island around 1910 where his name was "Anglicized."

I went by my middle name until my late teens -- "Suzanne" got shortened to "Suzy," which I hated, so I went to my first name. My (birth) father came from Holland, so I am named after his mother and another relative.

Sorry..
I don't agree with this at all. I could throw 15 surnames at you, and without valid documents or records, you would know nothing at all about their lives. A surname is only a 'tag', by which you identify those records. Never mind that you can and will find the exact same given names in the most prestigious families and those same names can be found in families who are poverty stricken.
The more actual research that you do, the more you find that surnames are nearly irrelevant to finding actual facts.

I agree with Wendy C.

That is cheating! There was a Miss World called Kimberley around about then, so you are just surmising. You just have to look about and see what the most popular girls name was around that time.

Surname does give information, if you know what to look for- mine is a Scottish, but no one realizes that. However, to stereotype by the wy a persons name sounds... I don't think that works.

Names Nicole. Out of curiosity, what does that say about me?