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Archiver > GEN-MEDIEVAL > 1998-03 > 0888806712


From: Denis Beauregard< >
Subject: Re: Common surnames
Date: Mon, 02 Mar 1998 02:45:12 GMT


"Pedro de Brito" <> wrote:
"Pedro de Brito" <> écrivait:

>Both in English and German, the most common surnames are profession
>designations: Smith - Schmidt, Taylor - Schneider, Miller - Mueller, etc.
>The same does not happen in the Romance languages - Portuguese, Spanish,
>French, Italian, and possibly in the other ones. There are some profession
>surnames, but they are not the most common ones, and not the oldest ones.
>Does any one know the reason for this, or of some research in this area.

I don't understand this one.

In French:

Smith - Schmidt => Lefebvre
Taylor - Schneider => Mercier
Miller - Mueller => Meunier

Lefebvre is very common. I don't have the figures for France however.

In Quebec, among tops re: Tremblay, Gagnon, Cote, Gauthier.

Tremblay and Cote nearly all descend from 1 couple
Gagnon from 2 brothers and 1 cousin
Gauthier was a first name and has many migrants

So this set of data is useless for that purpose.

Denis

Denis Beauregard, genealogiste
Maintenant paru: Dictionnaire genealogique de nos Origines,
Tome 1. Voir http://www.cam.org/~beaur/dgo/index.htm

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