In a message dated 31/12/2011 22:01:17 GMT Standard Time, [email protected] writes: Dear List Members, Could someone one be christened with the father's surname when their parents weren't married yet? Please, this is my dilemma. Yes, sometimes. I have met christenings and birth certificates in my 40 years of genealogy. Usually the mother's name is used but not infrequently both mother's and father's in a double barrelled form and occasionally just the father's. I suspect that the parents may have been living together without being married and the officiating minister may have been unaware of this