seesul
Senior Master Sergeant
Does anyone know the origin of Mc or Mac before the surnames (as perhabs McCartney) or what does it mean? There´s a lot of such a surnames in Scotland but in USA as well.
THX
THX
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have it buried in the Familie history somewhere which I need to pull out soon
Hi Lucky,
>It is only in the latter half of the 1800's and in the 1900's that people started to get rather precious about " their" particular spelling of the surname.
Was it always used like a surname? One of my ancestors was an Ole Andersen (son of Anders) from Norway, and googling for family trees, I found one (different, unfortunately) Ole Andersen whose father's name had been Anders Olsen. Easy to guess the grandfather's name!
So I wonder if the Scottish usage of Mac was at some time in history similar to the Scandinavian usage ...
Regards,
Henning (HoHun)
>MacWilliams? That's a Scottish and a Welsh name together!
Hm ... for a moment I thought MacSimowitz was Scottish and Serbian together
Mac or Mc in Scottish Gaelic means "son of".
There is no historical difference between Mac or Mc - they were originally used interchangeably and ancestry research on a particular family will often show records in one spelling , then later another. It is only in the latter half of the 1800's and in the 1900's that people started to get rather precious about " their" particular spelling of the surname.
No problem buddy, you're most welcome!Thanks for the clear answer Lucky!!!
Hi Lucky,
>But as far as I know Mac and Mc has been going on for a long time, far back in history...
Was it always an inherited surname that remained "fixed" for several generations, or was it possible that the grandfather was named Douglas MacGregor, the son Robert MacDouglas and the grandson Gregor MacDouglas?
That would be the Scandinavian pattern, but from what I've read about Scottish history, it might be a different concept, or at least the surnames became "fixed" much earlier than in Scandinavia.
Regards,
Henning (HoHun)