Strange names

Looking at very old documents, in this case parish baptismal records, names seem to have been spelt in a variety of strange ways, and in fact some strange names hare recorded. Following one line of investigation, I came across the first names Grass, Sumner and Somner, Fortune, Cutbart, Barbary, Allington, Thamar and Forby… There were also spellings of names we would know which are different, Elyzabeth and Willyam, for example, cropped up several times.

No doubt future genealogists will look back at some of the names of the current generation and think they are unusual; when i am writing my stories, people sometimes comment on the names my characters have. I always tell them that I research the names really carefully to make sure it is current for the age of the character, unless there is a specific reason for an unusual or odd name. My characters always have a back story, but I don’t necessarily include it; when we meet people in real life, we only have a part of their history or, we don’t know everything about them. Sometimes in my stories there is a significance about the name which is revealed as the story progresses, sometimes the reader might never know why someone is named in a particular way… the same as in real life!