Early Family Naming Traditions and Customs

During the 1600's and through the 1800's, many cultures followed the custom of naming their children in a specific manner, generation after generation. This was especially true to those people in the British Isles, Scotland, Ireland, England and Wales. This practice remained pretty much in tact as families began emigrating throughout the world, certainly among the Ulster Scots and the early settlers in Colonial America. This is, no doubt, why so many identical or similar names appear generation after generation within the same family. This practice continued, even as middle names became more common, beginning about the early 1800's, but waned somewhat by the middle or latter 1800's as cultures intermixed and traditions diminished. Although still used by some families, naming patterns and traditions seem no longer as widespread, or at least far less so.

In the early American colonies, there were several significant exceptions to these unwritten rules. Some families, ignoring any traditions, used familiar or important names of English origin, or those of Hebrew derivation, or sometimes names intended to have moral significance (i.e., Prudence) were used. The Puritans, often used direct biblical references, some obvious and some more obscure. The Quakers used a different more communal method where a name, often the parents or grandparents name, was carefully selected by the parents, certified by friends, witnessed by neighbors, and then entered in the register of the meeting.

Also common in early America was to name the eldest son after the father. This was to eliminate any ambiguity and ensure that the eldest son inherited, in the event the father died intestate, Primogeniture (the exclusive right of the eldest son to inherit the father's entire estate) being the law in those times.

In search of Scottish Ancestry - by Gerald Hamilton-Edwards, Phillimore, 1983 Edition

Colonial Homes magazine - by Myra Vanderpool Gormley, CG - Feb 1996, p. 24