Ireland XO
Back to Message Board

IRISH NAMING SYSTEM

Leitrim

Could you please tell me if the Irish Naming System has any credibility as far as researching one's family history?

Was this system of naming male children after grandfathers and fathers on both the fraternal and maternal sides of the family ever prevalent in County Leitrim?

I am finding that my Leitrim family didnt follow such a naming pattern. They were Catholic.

I am referring to the period late 1700s through the 1800s.

I have found however it can be useful but that it wasnt always strictly followed.

I have been told by someone living in Ireland today that "it was strictly followed". I disagree based on my research.

If a father had seven sons ....would each of the sons have to follow it in naming their children?

Would one child be named after the grandfather and father on father's side of the family, and also same on maternal side of family? Did this apply to female children?

Diane Gilhula

4 replies

I can’t comment on Co Leitrim in particular but across Ireland as a whole, not every family followed the naming pattern and even when they did there are lots of things that could upset it. Common ones that I have encountered are: 

when the father and either of the grandparents have the same name. So you obviously can’t really have two or even three sons all with the same name, so a different name is needed though some families did actually use the same name again on the birth certificate, but differentiated with another more informal name for day to day use. So if you had two Johns (as per birth certs) you just called one of them something else in day to day life;

if a child dies young, then it was common practice to re-use the name for the next birth. But if you don’t know about the death, your analysis of who they were named after could be completely wrong; 

Or if a close relative had just died and their name was used out of respect. 

I have also noticed that many families liked to name the odd child after the local Minister/Priest, schoolteacher or a relative with no children of their own. 

Sometimes people were christened with one name, but went by a different one (and would appear in censuses and other records by that alternative name), eg Henry & Harry or Ann & Nancy. 

So for all these reasons, whilst tradition says, for example, that the 4th son was named after the father's eldest brother, it isn’t always so.
The naming tradition did include females.

Elwyn, IrelandXO Volunteer ☘IrelandXO Volunteer

I've come acrosss the same results as Elwyn did.  Many people did follow the naming pattern, but sometimes they didn't, for various reasons.

In case you don't have the whole paradigm, this is what was generally the accepted practice:

  • First born son named after his father's father
  • Second born son named after his mother's father
  • Third born son named after his father
  • Fourth born son named after his father's oldest brother
  • Fifth born son named after his father's 2nd oldest brother or his mother's oldest brother

 

  • First born daughter named after her mother's mother
  • Second born daughter named after her father's mother
  • Third born daughter named after her mother
  • Fourth born daughter named after her mother's oldest sister
  • Fifth born daughter named after her mother's 2nd oldest sister or her father's oldest sister
kevin45sf@yahoo.com

While the tradition was generally followed with exceptions as outlined above, and it was so in my fathers family but not so on my mothers side as there seemed to have been some sort of family disagreement  there and out of six sons, not one was named after the husbands father. from 1865-1885.

Regards,Donie

donie_os@eircom.net

I would hear my mother in conversation with her Leitrim cousins " I haven't  heard from Michael Micky Michael for awhile , have you seen him. ? " Only to find years later Michael Micky Michael was actually baptised Joseph. 

unkatat@gmail.com

Reply

Reply
One image file up to 2 MB.