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Position:Home>Genealogy> Does anyone have the last name 'Tester' or any information about that laQuestion: Does anyone have the last name 'Tester' or any information about that last name & its origins? Thank you!!I am going to try some geneology sites & sources, but wanted to check here first! Additional Details 6 days ago 6 days ago 6 days ago Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: 6 days ago Thanks for the answers so far guys - it's very appreciated! Just an fyi..I have done research for Testers in my country (Canada) - and determined I'm related to about 95% of the ones I could track down - it's a very rare name.6 days ago I know about intensive research being required - that's something I'm seeking out + currently on. However, I was interested in if there were any Testers on here, or if anyone knows the initial country of origin for the name. Again, thanks again everyone! :)6 days ago Plus, every site I go to seems to just track down U.S. immigrants. Are there any that anyone knows of that aren't just U.S. focused? Tester English: nickname from Old French testard, a pejorative derivative of teste ‘head’ (see Testa). German: from Latin testa ‘head’, hence a nickname for someone with a large or otherwise remarkable head, or, especially in Bavaria, a topographic name for someone who lived at one end of a village or a row of fields, from the same word. German: metonymic occupational name for a silver smelter, from Bavarian test ‘furnace for refining silver’. It's very unusual I have never heard of it, sorry I cant help any more than that. Source(s): www.ancestry.com The following were given as place of origin by Tester immigrants to the U.S. England 13 Germany 12 Great Britain 3 Prussia 3 (now part of Germany and Poland) Holland 2 Italy 1 The origin of a surname is not a concern for people doing genealogy. The same surname can come from more than one nationality and also not everyone with the same surname is necessarily related. If this is your family name, the best thing to do is to trace your family starting with yourself and working back one generation at a time. Anytime you wish to do this, there are lots of good people on this board that can give you some great tips and advice. Just ask. Since you are seeking an origin of a name, please be wary of surname product peddlers like coats of arms. See links below http://www.college-of-arms.gov.uk/faq.ht... http://www.ngsgenealogy.org/comconsumerp... Does this help? http://genforum.genealogy.com/tester/... http://www.ancestry.com/?o_xid=21860&o_l... this section of answers is more like a 'lobby' into some real research, but you can get tons of guidance from here. And make some friends, too. Re having the same name... tip one is that unless you have a very uncommon name, you cannot rely on the idea that everyone named Tester is related. Names don't have one 'central' place of origin, they can come from any number of places. For example (in a way broad sense)... if you are working on Smith, you'd find 20 of them in a particular county. Genealogy is ALL about verification of who you are or are not related to. IF you are working a very very very rare name, that may be the exception. Example.. one of my lines is Fullingim, which turned out (with a bit of work) to be a specific variation of another surname. The origin of the name was a clerk who put down what he "heard", and it turns out that all of those ARE related. The original was Fillingham (a small village in England). As closely as I can theorize, the name started in the 1300's based on several persons who came "from" that village. Those aren't necessarily related. You have a catch 22. There is an area at www.genforum.com (and other places) where the 'board' is for anyone working a surname. http://genforum.genealogy.com/tester/... There are only 199 messages there. The best messages (anywhere) are those with solid info in the subject line, to help zoom in on persons who are likely to be researching your own line. The search box on the site is helpful, again, to NARROW down 'hits'. A message could have info of value, however, even if it does not contain your key word. I ALWAYS suggest that new persons take a look at this site.. http://www.cyndislist.com/topical.htm... It is HUGE, and is one I think you should bookmark. Just browsing through it, gives you some valuable resources. Keep in mind that it won't all be online. Research isn't a one shot deal.. if it were, that would spoil all the fun. And yes, pour yourself some coffee, and make yourself at home here. If you hit a brick wall (standard for research) post the specific name and locality here. You can almost count on someone doing a quick lookup in what they have, to get you past the brick wall. http://worldconnect.genealogy.rootsweb.c... has 6,379 entries. Every time I answer a "Surname Origin?" question, I think of the joke: Man sees a sign, "Olaf Olafson, Chinese Restaurant". He goes in, orders a plate of chow mein, asks the Chinese gentleman behind the counter who is Olaf. Chinese gentleman says, "Me! There I was at Ellis Island. The man in front of me was a Swede, six foot four, broad shoulders, red beard. They ask him 'Name?' he says 'Olaf Olafson', in a voice that makes the pens rattle in their holders. Off he goes to seek his fortune. They ask me 'Name?', I say 'Sam Ting', and here I am." Seriously, you should have 16 surnames among your great great grandparents, unless you double up on Smith, Johnson, Miller or Jones or someone married a cousin. If you are in the USA and trace your family tree, you might find an immigrant who came through Ellis Island yearning to be free, a bootlegger, a flapper, a great uncle who died in the muddy trenches of France in 1917. You may find someone who marched off to fight in the Civil War (Maybe two, one wearing blue, one wearing grey). You may find a German who became Pennsylvania "Dutch", a Huguenot, an Irish Potato Famine immigrant. You might find someone who married at 18 and supported his family with musket, plow and axe in the howling wilderness we now call Ohio. In the UK your chances of finding a homesteader are less, but your chances of finding that great uncle who served in WWI are better. In Australia you may find someone who got a free ride to a new home, courtesy of the benevolent Government and HM Prison ship "Hope". Your grandfather with that surname may have married a Scot, a Sioux, a Swede. HIS father, a stolid, dull protestant, may have married an Italian with flashing dark eyes, the first woman on the block to serve red wine in jelly glasses and use garlic in her stew. You'll never know if this is the only question you ask. Probaly english. http://www.surnamedb.com/surname.aspx?na... http://www.ancestry.com/learn/facts/fact... |