I was just wondering about how most of you deal with these in your family tree program. I am talking of course about the Fernades de Aguiars, or the Affonso da Silvas or the Martins de Nobregas etc etc... Do you use just the final surname as the last name or the conjoined names as the last name? I can't decide which is the easier way to find these people. The most frustrating thing is that you will find them with just one surname on one record and a conjoined surname on the next! Then, how do you decide which one to use? I seem to be going back and forth depending on the name...but it's getting really diffucult as my database is nearing 3000 names...and they are getting harder to find! I guess I'd really like to know if there is a geneaological standard for how to record these names. Cece

Cece, These are the rules I'm using, which I got from my own experience: 1. The "De" particle, as in "de Freitas" or "dos Santos" shall never be included in the surname; 2. Patronimics, as in "Maria Rodrigues daugther of Rui Fernandes, son of Fernão Dias" shall not be used as a surname, unless you're certain that it really has become a surname; 3. Always update the name to it's current version: No "Affonços" or "Hyeronimos" shall remain. And specific to the point of this thread, 4. Include every (useful) version of the name as an alias, if your software allows that. For example, Maria, daugther of João Correia de Aguiar and Ana de Freitas can be known as Maria Correia, Maria de Aguiar, Maria Correia de Aguiar or Maria de Freitas. 5. Try to make the distintion between nicknames and surnames. In the case of the "Gomes Jardim" Gomes is a true surname, while Jardim seems to be a nickname. When it is passed to the descendancy it was always "Gomes Jardim" or "Gomes", but never or very rarely "Jardim". The same with the "Gomes Perneta". On these cases I use "Gomes Jardim" as a surname. On the other cases, of double surnames, I do as in point 4 and *never* use them combined. With a database of more than 60.000 names, I can tell you that it is working quite well. :) Paulo On Sat, 26 Mar 2005 07:21:46 -0600, Cece Camara <cece@soccer4all.com> wrote: > I was just wondering about how most of you deal with these in your family > tree program. > I am talking of course about the Fernades de Aguiars, or the Affonso da > Silvas or the Martins de Nobregas > etc etc... > > Do you use just the final surname as the last name or the conjoined > names as > the last name? > I can't decide which is the easier way to find these people. The most > frustrating thing > is that you will find them with just one surname on one record and a > conjoined surname on the next! > Then, how do you decide which one to use? > > I seem to be going back and forth depending on the name...but it's > getting > really diffucult > as my database is nearing 3000 names...and they are getting harder to > find! > > I guess I'd really like to know if there is a geneaological standard for > how > to record these names. > > Cece > > > > > ============================== > Search Family and Local Histories for stories about your family and the > areas they lived. Over 85 million names added in the last 12 months. > Learn more: http://www.ancestry.com/s13966/rd.ashx > -- " Pallida mors aequo pulsat pede pauperum tabernas regumque turres." -- Horacio