Norwegian names:Should one routinely add the farm name?
I'd like everyone's opinion on the pluses and minuses of routinely adding the farm name (as given in the christening record) to all last names of Norwegian ancestors - ie in the Vitals section: Carl Erich /Pedersen Gransbråten or Carl Erich/Pedersen?
Answers
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Absolutely yes!
Unless it it clear that the family did not use the farm name and that would depend on where the individual lived, the customs of that area, and the person's social status.
Here are my reasons:
1) My father-in-law says so. He was born on the island of Stord in Hordaland, Norway, now lives in Bergen, and would be quite offended if you strip off the surnames from his ancestors. As would most people of western Norway.
2) My wife's great-uncle, Ola Høyland, the author of the Stord Bygdebok and a few other genealogical works routinely used farm names as people's surnames in his writings. Other bygdebok authors also routinely used the farm name as people's surnames, as in this excerpt from the Bømlo Bygdebok:
Here the farm name is used every time as a surname except for the one woman in which there is apparently some doubt about her name. There are no commas to set off the farm name as something other than part of their names.
3) Geni in their instructions for entering Norwegian names requires that one does:
https://www.geni.com/projects/Introduksjon-til-Geni-norsk/3288
Specifically, they say to put the first name in the first name box, the patronymic in the middle name box (these are combined in Family Tree to the single first name box), and the last name, family name or farm name in the last name box, depending on the time period.
4) Looking through My Heritage at family trees entered by Norwegians, they appear to always do so:
This means that when the same pattern is used in Family Tree, one gets the best results when using the My Heritage link on a person's detail page.
5) Including the farm name is the best way to prevent confusion and incorrect merges. It is far more likely that someone is going to merge Ola Olsson b 1835, Stord, Ola Olsson b 1835, Stord, and Ola Olsson b 1835, Stord, than they are Ola Olsson Høyland b 1835, Høyland, Stord, Ola Olsson Vikanes, b. 1835, Vikanes, Stord, and Ola Olsson Brandvik, b. 1835, Brandvik, Stord. It is also important to always include the full place name of a person's residence even when the full name is not included in the standardized version. Thousands of place names still need to be added to the place name database for Norway.
Last year sometime I tried out various configurations for Norwegian names and found that Hints and Possible Duplicates routines worked best if I enter Norwegian names this way:
Vitals Name: First name and Patronymic / Farm Name or Family Name at birth.
Other Information Alternate Name: First Name / Patronymic
That is,
Vitals: Jon Olsson / Brandvik
Other Information: Jon / Olsson
Sometimes, if needed for clarity, I do include in the Other information section all the names a person used throughout life with suitable reason statements.
The main arguments again using the farm name that I have seen are that:
1) The farm name would change when a person moved. So what? Women's names changed every time they got married. We seem to be able to deal with that just fine.
2) The farm name was a residence or address, not a name. Not according to authors of Bygdebok when they clearly used it as part of a person's name.
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Fixed all the typos I could find and completed my post. If you only read my initial post via an e-mail, please go back and read the final version.
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The name of the farm is the address where a family lived within a parish in Norway. Around 1920 a law was passed where a person was to take their father's last name or a farm name.
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Thank you, Gordon, for your well-stated answer. Very informative. The reasons for adding the farm name seem very compelling. I wonder if the best solution would be for FS to actively encourage that option by adding a "Farm Name" field when you select Norwegian as the prefered language as you enter a name. Right now there is no difference in the naming format whether you use the default English or actually select Norwegian. (As opposed to some of the Asian languages which will actually flip the name order, for example.)
At the very least, a note in the FS Norway WIKI as to what the prefered convention should be would go a long way in nudging users toward conformity which, in turn, would improve the overall quality and accuracy of the database without adding undue complexity.
One other question, what is your reasoning for putting the patronymic in the First Names field and not the Last Names field with the farm name?
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I enter the names like this:
For two reasons. First of all, that is what the Norwegian experts at Geni require. Secondly, I have found through experience working in Family Tree that the Possible Duplicates and Hints routines work best when the last name is either "Eskeland" or "Larsdatter" rather than "Larsdatter Eskeland." Since you cannot tell any difference on the person's detail page, it really doesn't matter from that stand point. So I like to make sure the program works as well as possible. I do always include the strictly patronymic form of people's names under other information like this:
Here is another extended discussion on this topic:
https://getsatisfaction.com/familysearch/topics/a-survey-for-those-working-in-norwegian-record
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The last isarsdatter and Eskeland is the name of the farm where she lived at that time. I would put the farm name Eskeland in the note if you are entering the name in your family tree. A person could move several times and that means she would live on several farms. It is nice to follow a person as he or she moves from farm to farm, but as for a farm name it is where he or she lived. Later on, in the late1800 or early 1900 a person could use a farm name. There was a law around 1923, where a person could take a farm name or take their father's last name only. A person also could take a farm name in stead of a patronymic name when living in America. Hope this helps.
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In Family Tree and on My Heritage and in Geni, many people, including many Norwegians do use the farm name of birth as I do above as can be seen be wandering around these sites. It it perfectly acceptable to do so and I really think it helps in proper identification and prevents incorrect merges
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