I’m indexing a baptism batch from Zambia. I am having problems finding the surname.
There is a column labeled “cognomen”. Is this really a nickname or is it possibly the surname?
Answers
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognomen Wikipedia page Cognomen. According to Wikipedia cognomen can mean a "surname" or "any name, especially a nickname".
Looking at the record, some of the names appear to be 2nd Christian names, rather than surnames.
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That’s what I thought. I’ll use my better judgment. Thanks for your reply!
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If it's in the Cognomen column it is almost always the Surname. You may have noticed that many people from Zambia and Zimbabwe for example have Surnames that we might consider as Given names. For example Robert, Matteo, Angela, Angeli, Bruce, Henry, Patricia. It was a common naming custom. I assume that the parent just liked a name and they used it for either Given or Surnames.
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If that second column is a "surname" then "surname" doesn't mean the same thing in Zambian practice as it does in "English". Note that there are a couple of families in there with two or more children but different entries in the second column, where I'd expect to see the same name if it were genuinely a surname/family name column.
Is there a Zambian group to ask the question in?
NB - if cognomen was supposed to be surname in the English sense, this wouldn't be the first time that I've seen documents used slightly differently from their intended use.
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@Adrian Bruce1 Yes, I see what you mean. I am currently doing marriages from Zambia in 1953. I've noticed that the Priest had an Italian name. As we know the Italian East Africa regime established Colonies in Africa including Zambia and some stayed there after WWII while others immigrated there for economic reasons. It's interesting as almost all of the people being married had Italian given and surnames, but parents each had different tribal names. I'm guessing the officiant was Italian and just assigned Italian names to the spouses. There currently exists a population of Italians in the Lusaka area. One does best by just recording what is written.
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