St. Louis Genealogical Society Blog: Dealing with Nicknames in Our Genealogy

15 November 2021

Dealing with Nicknames in Our Genealogy

We are used to nicknames; we see them all the time. We all know that Bill is short for William and Susie is most often Susan or Susannah. Our ancestors frequently had nicknames; they are nothing new. But sometimes we are confronted with nicknames that are confusing and need a bit of interpreting. This week, we will look at some.

Do you have female ancestors that were called Nannie, Annie, Nan, or Ann? Chances are, they started out as Nancy. Mamie, Molly/Mollie, and Polly were and still are common nicknames for Mary. Nick or Nicky are obviously Nicholas, but so is Colley. Elizabeth has many variants: Liz, Beth, Eliza, Bess, Bessie, Betsey, and Betty are just some, and Queen Elizabeth II (and now her great-granddaughter) use Lilibet. Robert is often Bob or Rob, but in the U.K., it's likely Robin (hardly ever used as a girl's name there).

Watch for pronunciation as a factor in nicknames. For instance, in the U.K., Ralph is most usually pronounced as Rafe. We might think of that as a nickname for Raphael, but it might not be. Morrie in the U.S. is a nickname for Morris. But in Great Britain, Maurice is pronounced as Morris, so Morrie or Maury could be either name.

Names from other parts of the world undergo the same transformations. The Dutch name Cornelius can become Con or Cor or Neil. Its female equivalent, Cornelia, can soften to Neeltje. The German name Friedrich may be Fritz. The French name Genevieve might be shortened to Gigi and the boy's name Percival might be Perry.

By the way, the origin of the word "nickname" is a fun fact. In Old English, the word for "also" was "eac," pronounced with a hard "c." So an extra or additional name was an "eke name." Over time, the "n" from "an" migrated into the next syllable, and the phrase became "nekename," now spelled just a bit more like we pronounce it.

Hints to Help with Nicknames

Here are some points you want to consider as you work with your own family.

It is extremely common for people to be using multiple names, depending on the circumstances. You may find a child called Eleanor on a birth register listed as Nellie on a census and again as Nell or Ellen or Ella on a marriage record.
Thoroughly research each nickname before making any assumptions.

Ann and Nancy may be two different people in one family but the same woman in another.
Eliza and Elizabeth might be one person, or it is quite possible that they are two separate individuals in the same family. You'd be surprised how often families used derivatives of names they thought were important.
People were given names like Jimmy and Judy as birth names, not nicknames, so don't automatically turn them into James and Judith!

When writing nicknames in genealogy, we use quotation marks and not parentheses. Parentheses are reserved for maiden names.

Mary "Polly" Smith married Anthony "Tony" Carillo and became Mary "Polly" (Smith) Carillo.
Angelique "Angie" Chalfont married Jacques Junot and became Angelique "Angie" (Chalfont) Junot.

Become familiar with old-fashioned abbreviations. It's common to see Sam'l for Samuel, Jas for James (not Jasper!), Chas for Charles, and Jehu for John, among many others.