Carnival of Eastern European Genealogy

Steve Danko hosted the 11th edition of the Carnival of Eastern European Genealogy centered on given names.

These Carnivals of Genealogy are very useful. We are challenged to respond to topics we haven't really thought about or addressed in our blogs. Each participant handles the topic from his or her own viewpoint and we all learn from each other.

The charge for this challenge was:

The topic for this edition is First (Given) Names: Did any of your ancestors have an unusual given name? Have you discovered the meanings behind the given names of your ancestors? Did your ancestors use any naming patterns for their children? Are there any given names that are particularly common in your family history? Did any of your ancestors have given names that you particularly like or dislike? Does your family celebrate “Name Days”? Did your immigrant ancestors change their given names after they arrived in America? Tell us about the first (given) names in your family. You can concentrate on one name, a few names, or you can go wild and write about the first names of all your ancestors!

Participants included Jessica Oswalt of Jessica's Genejournal (German); Lisa of 100 Years in America (Hungarian and Croatian); Julie Cahill Tarr at GenBlog; Donna Pointkouski of What's Past is Prologue (Bavarian and Polish); Jasia of Creative Gene and Al’s Polish-American Genealogy Research on their Polish names; Steve's own Polish names; and, of course, Tracing the Tribe's "Here's a Leib, There's a Leib!" which touched on Belarus and Iran.

About Tracing the Tribe, Steve wrote:

Schelly Talalay Dardashti of Tracing the Tribe: The Jewish Genealogy Blog writes about her family’s practice of naming children after their relatives. This practice results in an interesting conundrum when all the children in a single family decided to name one of their sons after the child’s grandfather. And so, today, anyone with the name Leib Talalay, wherever he may live, is probably a cousin. Read all the details at Here’s a Leib, there’s a Leib! While you’re at it, you’ll find out why Schelly’s daughter loves her given name and initials, and why Schelly was once known as Shirley! Thanks for a great article, Schelly. It’s a fascinating read!

This was a great topic, Steve. Thank you for this opportunity.

Do read descriptions and pointers to all participant entries at Steve's link above.