>>> I have a Charles William Smith born Dublin circa 1826, whom I cannot locate a birth for. Would anyone know if this is an Irish surname or coulde it be Smyth or some other variation. Any adive appreciated thank Jen Australia <<< Jen, do not attach too much importance to spellings of names. Firstly, many common folk were illiterate, or only partially literate, and either relied on others to document their names or spelled them differently from time to time. (Any stigma attached to illiteracy of our ancestors is a purely modern invention.) Secondly, many records you will be searching through will either be handwritten (in which case you'll be dealing with wildly variant handwriting) or transcriptions (in which case the transcriber will have dealt with wildly variant handwriting). Either way, the consistency of spelling should not be a great concern to you. Smith, Smyth, Smythe - they're all the same. Since you're looking in Dublin, it's most likely your ancestors were English-speakers. However, if your research takes you "beyond the Pale" (into the Irish countryside), then be aware that Smith is MacGabhann in Irish. The word smith is usually associated with blacksmithing, and a gabha is a blacksmith. MacGabhann sounds like McGowan (which is how it's often anglicized), but I shouldn't be surprised to see McGavin as well. Another hangup people often have with Irish surnames is Mac vs Mc - the correct spelling in Gaelic is Mac; the more common spelling in English is Mc; often the Mac/Mc was dropped altogether in order to appear less "Irish". Some names start with Fitz- which is from the Norman French "fils" which means son, the same meaning as - you guessed it - Mac. The English fashion (taken from Scandinavian & German) was to append -son. So you could rightly say that Fitzjohn, Johnson, Jackson, and MacSheain are all the same surname. How's that for conplicating one's research? Check out Wikipedia for an intersting article on the name Smith - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith_(surname) Good luck with your research. Brad Wilson