I was trying to decide if Thomas & Barbara Gorvett having children in Frithelstock, Devon could be the same as Thomas & Barbara GORVIN having children in Monkleigh with in the same 15 year time frame, with Barbara being on the more "uncommon name" side of things. I did my own little name study in 5 neighboring towns in Devon for the time of early parish records (late 1500s) through roughly 1750. I used names in the baptismal records and it really isn't very scientific but interesting. I found that the names Mary, Ann and Elizabeth accounted for almost 50% of the female baptisms and the names Joan/Joanne and Grace or Jane accounted for the next almost 15 percent. So those female name accounted for roughly 65 to 70 percent of all women! Margaret and Susan/Susannah and Rebecca taking up the next big chunks. But the names tended to be more popular in certain towns (i.ei Rebecca being in 4.3% place in Petersmarland but only little more than 1% in other towns). The men's side of things was even more drastic! John & William alone accounted for almost 45% of all men. Thomas was third in most towns, usually around 8-10% although Samuel was third in one town. I had looked at some research done using towns that were elsewhere in England (sorry cannot find it now) and they had Barbara as a more common woman's name. I found this not to be true in the little section of Devon where I looked. Barbara was not even on the radar! Like I said, very unscientific, but the chances of a man remarrying a "Mary" would be much more likely than remarrying another "Frances" . Betsy