Progress , I think......... a Google search for <de la fond > or <de la fonds > reveals that De La Fond was a <Huguenot> family name , and it was also used as a middle name . The Sieurs (Lords) of De La Fond were certainly landowners in Brittany , near St Jacques de la Lande , where a local church was destroyed in the wars of religion -see this website if you read French (copy and paste without linebreaks or extraspaces -if stuck, use Google to find it) http://www.ifrance.com/heberg/pubp.htm?Time=1060545702& Url=/frey-roger/saint-jacques-de-la-lande.htm&Nom=frey-roger&POP=1 Another webpage gives: Anne Marie de Chabot. .................... her book Histoire de la maison de Chabot de Souville, olim Chabaud de Tourrettes (1982). She did a superb job extending and documenting the Chabot family. In particular, we are impressed by her masterful analysis of conflicting documents to prove that Antoine Chabot, the husband of Catherine Lombard, is the same Antoine Chabaud, sieur de La Fond from Provence who was once a knight in the order of St. John of Jerusalem (1: 282-296). He abandoned this celibate order around 1554 when he moved to Paris, became a Huguenot, and married. The name De La Fond also appears in the list of naturalised Huguenots on the useful webpage: http://www.rootsweb.com/~fianna/surname/hug3.html I think it likely , therefore , that the text: Tabourdeux, Jaques, f. de Jean de la fonds, ouvrier en soye should translate Tabourdeux, Jaques, son of Jean De La Fonds Tabourdeux , silk worker or possibly Tabourdeux, Jaques , son of Jean Tabourdeux De La Fonds ( The d and the s in Fonds were probably silent at about this period ) A historical French dictionary search online doesn't reveal any good candidate for <fonds> as an ordinary noun - wrong gender or number. Unless anyone knows better? Robert Hillier