Pam, Jim, Chris, Nora, Howard & All: A scholarly source on French other naming patterns would certainly be most welcome! Unfortunately, I found no such source in my admittedly casual quest. Perhaps no other culture adhered to naming patterns with the same devotion as the Dutch but, across many cultures and historical eras, parents have named children in honor of their own parents and themselves. Take another look at my recent GARRISON article for _New Netherland Connections_ (_NNC_) that provided the starting context for this message thread... http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~streeter/garrison.pdf The simple fact that John-4 & Hannah (-----) GARRISON named a daughter Esther/Hester was one of the most important--albeit *speculative*--clues that ultimately led to identifying John-4 GARRISON as the son of Johannes/John-3 & Hester (------) GERRITSEN/GARRISON. Without that clue, I would have never invested the time, effort and expense required to identify a living descendant of John-4 GARRISON and persuade him to take a DNA test for comparison with known GARRISON descendants of Gerrit-1 Jansen van Oldenburg, thereby confirming that John-4 was the son of Johannes/John-3 & Hester. In many other cases, considering naming patterns, or simply observing given names in common between previously un-linked families, Dutch and otherwise, has provided enough clues to develop a theory that was subsequently proven through conventional research and/or DNA testing. For example, see another article from _NNC_... Perry Streeter and Mike Morrissey, "Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) Testing of Probable Eighth Cousins Confirms Their Kinship and Proves Their Matrilineal Lines of Descent from Aeltje Cornelis (COOL) (VAN COUWENHOVEN) STOOTHOFF; Simultaneously Proving Two Long-Held Theories Developed Sequentially Through Conventional Research; Mary (UPDIKE) RICHEY of Greenwood, Steuben County, New York Was a Heretofore Unidentified Daughter of Roliph-5 UPDIKE (John-4, Lawrence-3, Johannes-2, Louris11 Jansen); Eleanor-5 "Nelly" LANE (Gizebert-4, Mathias-3, Gysbrecht-2 Laenen, Matthys-1 Jansen) Was the Heretofore Unidentified Wife of Roliph-5 UPDIKE" (April, May, June 2005; Volume 10, Number 2) which is also available online as... http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~streeter/NNC/mtdna.pdf I don't know if I will ever be able to determine the origins of any of my GARRISON "grandmothers," Elisabeth GYSBERTS, Hester, Hannah and Elizabeth, but I don't see any way to potentially solve these puzzles other than putting forth theories for others with greater subject matter expertise and/or access to resources to help me prove or refute. If I had not taken this approach, we would still know nothing about the origins of Jane (GARRISON) KRUSEN, Mary (UPDIKE) RICHEY and many of my other early Steuben County, New York "immigrant" ancestors. Jane's branch of the family tree is still somewhat sparse... http://wc.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=PED&db=streeter&id=I760 .but I have high hopes that, with the help of others, this branch will eventually grow denser, including Jane's lines of descent from colonial BARBER & FOSTER immigrants. For more *speculation* on these and many other family history mysteries of New Netherland and beyond, please see... http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~streeter/questions.htm Your collaboration could eventually yield another article for _New Netherland Connections_ or another scholarly publication. For more on _NNC_, please see... http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~streeter/NNC/ Thanks again to everyone else on this list who have been so helpful to me over the years! Perry www.perry.streeter.com

Using the "Click to Look Inside!" feature for this source @ Amazon.com... http://www.amazon.com/Means-Naming-History-Stephen-Wilson/dp/1857282442#_ ...I was able to extract the following: Yet another element must be woven into the pattern by which first names were transmitted, for in many parts of Europe children were named after godparents. Baptism and naming has become even more closely identified in the late medieval and early modern periods... Naming at the font was also established in France and England by this time, and it survived the Reformation... The custom developed in France “towards the end of the Middle Ages and reached its height from the sixteen to the mid nineteenth century.” [24]… In Nantes in the sixteenth century between 80 and 90 per cent of boys were named after godfathers. Figures of over 90 per cent were found in… Flanders… So pervasive was the custom that it was also followed by Protestants... Two alternative models were used in the choice of godparents and hence their names. In one – the commonest – god parents were selected from among relatives…. Often the rulers were stricter, running parallel to and reinforcing those for the transmission of names from kin that we have already encountered…. for example, “one takes for the first child the paternal grandfather and the maternal grandmother, for the second the elder brother of the father and the elder sister of the mother.”[26] Here balance between the paternal and maternal kin was carefully maintained... The second model was to choose godparents from outside the circle of relatives. This was a way of providing children and families with a wider network of contacts and especially with patronage in higher social strata... (227-9) Unfortunately, the endnotes for this excerpt were not accessible but you can read more of the content for yourself and even search on key words throughout the book via the link provided above. Perry Jul 22, 2010 08:56:26 AM, [email protected] wrote: Barbara: Thank you for your insights. This looks like an interesting source to track down... Wilson, Stephen. 1998. The means of naming: a social and cultural history of personal naming in western Europe. London: UCL Press. http://www.worldcat.org/title/means-of-naming-a-social-and-cultural-history-of-personal-naming-in-western-europe/oclc/185673869 Perry