Help in getting the correct Spelling for Ancestors last name. Denmark, Norway, and Sewden.

LegacyUser

Susan Hilbrand said: For those with ancestors from Denmark, Norway, Sweden for example. The fathers first name becomes the childs name ending in SEN in Denmark for boys, and Datter for the girls. It would be helpful if the ending of these names were available to those that don't know this. I for one am looking for anything a 2 time great Grandmother from Denmark. Her name is some form of Mary and her father would have Peter or Petter. I have found that I like Family Search for most of my information but I also use Ancestory is there a way to merge my research.

LegacyUser

A van Helsdingen said: If you are a Latter Day Saint, then you can get a free Ancestry account and also have access to a feature that allows you to synchronize your family tree on Ancestry with the FamilySearch Family Tree.

LegacyUser

Gordon Collett said: Where are you seeing the incorrect names?

Also, one point, getting back only a hundred years, there is no such thing as correct spelling.

I have seen my wife's Norwegian relatives recorded in the parish registers with patronymics ending in -son, -sson, -sen, -ssen, -søn, -ssøn, -zen. All of these are correctly spelled.

Fortunately, the search engine for FamilySearch is so well engineered, that searching for someone with the last name of Jonsdatter will bring up Jonsdatter, Jonsdotter, and all varieties of Jonsen.

As a side note, in records starting about 1890 people started using fixed surnames rather than patronymics and between one source and the next, for example, Anna Olsdatter, the daughter of Ole Hansson will suddenly become either Anna Olsen or Anna Hansen depending on what the family decided to use.