Hello -   I am new to this list and am hoping someone is familiar with a surname I have in my family.   My great-great Aunt Lena KRANZ wrote up a short genealogy of her parents.  The information was given to her by her mother, Augusta Wilhelmina to write down. Augusta gave her maiden name as LOEIVE.  I have never been able to find this surname in any database.  Has any one ever heard of this name?   Cindy Drage

Hi Cindy, This is a tough one. The surname Löwe/Loewe is my suggestion. Instead of just giving you the fish, I show you how to fish so others who read this may use the same techniques with their surname mysteries. V in German is pronounced like F so be sure to try F in place of V. W in German is pronounced like V in English so given that a German speaking person was telling an English speaking person her details, the V could very well be a W in the German spelling. OE is a common English (and even German) way to substitute for an umlauted O (an O with two dots above it) The letter I in this position would be very unusual and probably is just plain wrong for the German spelling. I tried several combinations in the German surname mapping site Geogen ( http://christoph.stoepel.net/geogen/en/Default.aspx ) but got nowhere. Soundex (a system for recording names that ignores vowels and groups consonants by similar sounds) would be helpful. The online German phonebook (millions of current German surnames) has a feature that will take your entry and, if you check the "similarities" box in the expanded search page, will give you what its search engine (using a type of Soundex slanted toward German phonetics) thinks are similar names. To do this yourself, go to http://www.infobel.com/en/world/Teldir.aspx?url=http://www.dastelefonbuch.de/ and select English and then expanded search. Assuming the letter I is just plain out of place, I entered LOVE for the surname and checked the similarities box. Bingo, Löwe (or Loewe) came up as a major possibility. The word Löwe, by the way, means lion in German. Taking that name back to Geogen, I see it has over 2,000 modern listings as a surname and is spread all over Germany. I think anyone who knows English spelling and German phonetics would agree that Löwe is an excellent candidate for your target surname. Remember that even the Germans might spell it Loewe. The name would be pronounced approximately as the word for window blinds Louvres without the r or the s. The addition of the letter I was the writer's attempt to spell a sound we just don't use in English. Go back to the word Louvres. Drop the s. Drop the r. You've got Louve. To change the first vowel sound represented by OU to the proper German sound which was OE (umlauted O), you must make an O sound with your lips pursed (tight little O) but do no allow it to become a dipthong (two vowels). To account for this, I believe the writer added the letter I. Remember the final e is pronounced something like A. This suggests to me that your writer/informant (the great-great aunt) knew something about German spelling because she, in fact, came quite close to the correct spelling if you drop the I and change the V to W. Hope this puts you on the right track. Paul near Portland -------------------------------------------------- From: "Cindy Drage" <[email protected]> Sent: Wednesday, June 03, 2009 7:04 AM To: <[email protected]> Subject: [PRUSSIA-ROOTS] Surname help > Hello - > > I am new to this list and am hoping someone is familiar with a surname I > have in my family. My great-great Aunt Lena KRANZ wrote up a short > genealogy of her parents. The information was given to her by her mother, > Augusta Wilhelmina to write down. Augusta gave her maiden name as LOEIVE. > I have never been able to find this surname in any database. Has any one > ever heard of this name? > > Cindy Drage

L[oe]ive = ö Cindy. It may be written as Löive (alt + 148 from the keypad) or something similar. Bob~~ ------------- Subject: [PRUSSIA-ROOTS] Surname help Hello - I am new to this list and am hoping someone is familiar with a surname I have in my family. My great-great Aunt Lena KRANZ wrote up a short genealogy of her parents. The information was given to her by her mother, Augusta Wilhelmina to write down. Augusta gave her maiden name as LOEIVE. I have never been able to find this surname in any database. Has any one ever heard of this name? Cindy Drage ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message