Writing Prompt #2
Naming Your Child the French-Canadian Way
Growing up I always knew that on my dads side of the family all
his siblings were named after an aunt or uncle. Dad himself was a
junior taking his fathers name. Over the past week while putting my
family tree together using Ancestry.com, I had started to notice a
pattern in the family names. Following mostly the men in the family
to make it easier to track the family name, I noticed all the boys
were named after other men in the past generations. The pattern
flowed right onto my aunts and uncles prompting me to investigate
if there was any rhyme or reason to this madness.
We are French. French-Canadian to be more exact, for five
generations. I was not sure from where and when our family entered
the United States until I started my research for our family tree
assignment. I successfully tracked seven generations in France and
then five generations in Canada before seeing where my
Great-Grandfather was born in New York and my grandfather was born
in Connecticut. Connecticut is still where most of my family
resides and where I was born and raised.
According to Judy Schneider, French Naming Conventions, in
French-Canadian customs there is a naming tradition which makes
sense for the pattern of names I found in our family tree.
According to Schneider, Up until the mid-1900s French-Canadian
first names given at the time of baptism had a certain structure.
Usually, not always, the child was given three names. The first
name, often Marie or Joseph indicated the sex of the baby. The
second name was often the name of the sex appropriate God-parent.
The third was the name the child was called. (Schneider) In my
family tree I found twelve Josephs.
In my more immediate family it is a bit out of order. For
example my oldest Uncle was named after my Great-Grandfather who
was named after his father. My second Uncle was named after my
grandfathers brother, and then my dad who was the third boy was
then named after his father. For the generations which supersede my
dads, there are many of the patterns as described in French Naming
Conventions. When I asked my dad what he and his brothers
christened names were, his answer was Joseph from what he could
remember. So while they seemed to follow that tradition then, no
one uses that name anymore.
As simple as this sounds, it was very confusing as a child
growing up. A family member would tell a story of about Aunt Sybil
and I would think they were talking about my dads sister, but in
reality it was a story about their Aunt Sybil, my great Aunt. I do
see the benefits to trace a family line but none the less confusing
to tell family stories.
Works Cited
Schneider, Judy. French Naming Conventions
catudals.com/search/label/French%20Naming%20Conventions N.p.,
October 25, 2012. January 20, 2015
