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What to Do about Dit Names
I would like some help in solving an issue with how to enter some names in my Ancestry.com file. Presently, I am working on my son-in-law's gnealogy tree and ran across this rather unique situation. The surnames appear as "dit" in French Candian records. I had to look that up to find out what it even meant. Dit means "known as" so I have some people with their first, middle, and last names included along with "dit" for whom they were known as. I guess they changed their names for some reason.
An example of this is seen in a man named Pierre Levesque who had several children each of whom changed or used a different last name. One is referred to as "Jacuqes Levesque dit LaFrance. My problem is where to enter the information. As Levesque is the original surname but not used as a middle name would I use it or LaFrance as an alternate name and not refer to this "dit" at all or enter Levesque into the first, middle name field and LaFrance into the surname field? I want to do it correctly and have it downloaded properly into a GEDCOM file to use in FTM2010 and Legacy. Does anyone have any suggestion on who to approach this dilemma?
Thanks,
Steph
An example of this is seen in a man named Pierre Levesque who had several children each of whom changed or used a different last name. One is referred to as "Jacuqes Levesque dit LaFrance. My problem is where to enter the information. As Levesque is the original surname but not used as a middle name would I use it or LaFrance as an alternate name and not refer to this "dit" at all or enter Levesque into the first, middle name field and LaFrance into the surname field? I want to do it correctly and have it downloaded properly into a GEDCOM file to use in FTM2010 and Legacy. Does anyone have any suggestion on who to approach this dilemma?
Thanks,
Steph
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Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Russ Worthington on
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Steph,
Here is where you can find the answer for the Family Tree Maker program.
Please go to the Knowledge Base website at
http://ancestry.custhelp.com/
and enter 3765 in the Search Support box on that page.
Hope that helps,
Russ -
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Permalink Reply by Parker E. Dean on
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Family Tree Maker 2009 had a FACT "Known As" you could add to the individual. I've used it often for my family.
I'm assuming FTM2010 has the same Fact. If not, you should have an option to create a NEW fact. -
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Parker,
I am not sure that the AKA FACT should be used in this specific case. Family Tree Maker does handle the 'dit' as well as other types of naming conventions. The Knowledge Base article that I referred to, lists that types of names.
Russ -
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Permalink Reply by Sarah Coles on
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Thanks guys for the advice. Russ, I did look up the link you sent which applies to FTM and that's fine. However, I need to know how to enter the correct information into my Ancestry.com tree first which I will then download to FTM2010 and Legacy also. Right now I'm assuming that FTM will handle "dit" situations which you commented on.
I looked into format for Legacy and can't find anything about this "dit" situation. I went ahead and entered the two surnames with "dit" in the middle on some of the names and will do a trial GED download to both software to see what happens. I noticed in the knowledge base they mentioned using backslashes at the beginning and end of the two names as an alternative but that applies to previous versions of FTM. Anyway, I'll see how it works out and let you know. Thanks again.
Steph -
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Steph,
I don't enter data into Ancestry Family Trees. You might want to post your question on the Ancestry Family Tree Genealogy Wise Group. I only know Family Tree Maker.
Here is a link to the Ancestry Family Tree group:
http://www.genealogywise.com/group/ancestryfamilytreeusers
Russ -
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Russ, that link you give is this group where I posted this discussion. Check the top of this page.
Steph -
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Steph,
I just realized that. Sorry. Hopefully someone here can answer your question.
Sorry,
Russ -
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Russ, that's OK. We all make mistakes. You had me thinking I put it in the wrong place. Well, I did a lot of searching and nowhere can I find any info as to how to enter these guys into the tree on Ancestry.. I feel like disowning these people from the tree as that would make life a lot simplier. LOL
Steph -
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Russ, I just joined another Group, Ancestry users, and posted on there my question. Maybe someone in that group will know.
Steph -
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Permalink Reply by Glenn Townley on
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Hi Steph, The ancestry help page Russ pointed to earlier is helpful, but its explanation misses the point that you're looking to work through Steph. The problem with entering surnames in both Ancestry and FTM is that the "dit" is recognized as a part of the name... and that is not its purpose in French Canadian historical records. As you have already noted, "dit" is similar in use to "aka", which we would never want to suggest was an actual part of a name. (There's a concise paragraph regarding the French Canadian "dit" usage included on the Wikipedia page for "Surname".)
In Ancestry we get defined fields to give the surname as we wish it to be recorded. In FTM, the program defaults assume the surname to be the last standalone part of what we enter, except when preceded by a limited number of permitted pre-nominals which, when seen by the program, are assumed to be a true part of the genuine surname. Ancestry includes "dit" in this list but not in its "aka" usage as in the situation we are looking at here. While this is the default surname interpretation in Ancestry, we are given the means to override this default by entering our name data with a backward slash ("\") marking out where the true surname starts and ends. This use of "\" works in both Ancestry and in FTM, and so we can enter a surname to exclude the "dit" part if it serves our purpose to do so.
The way both Ancestry and FTM permit control over multiple-part surnames may be of some help, but not entirely to my satisfaction, as I too have a significant number of "dit" individuals in my tree. Ultimately we want to record the AKA in both Ancestry and FTM to recognize a person may appear in the historical record under different names. I generally enter the name without the "nom-dit" as the primary name of my ancestor, and then enter the full name including the "nom-dit" into the AKA field(s). Unfortunately I can not yet find a way to have the AKA variations of the name appear within the surname index as I would prefer. (Though there may be a simple answer to this that I've not yet reasoned out.) An example: my 3xGreat-Grandmother was Marie Ursule Séguin dit Laderoute. I may enter her in 3 different manners, i.e.
(Primary) Marie Ursule Séguin
(AKA 1) Marie Ursule Séguin dit Laderoute
(AKA 2) Marie Ursule Laderoute
But in the index, when she only appears as Marie Ursule Séguin, she might go unnoticed by other Ancestry researchers whose attention might only be drawn to one of her AKAs which don't appear in the indices.
It may be that much of this is obvious, but I thought I might summarize the issue and note what I think are the options we have and their limitations.
All the best, Glenn (Toronto) -
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Dear Glenn,
Due to family issues I have not been able to do anything on the computer so I apologize for not getting back to you on your great explanation to this "dit" dilemma until now. I agree with you on the solution to this problem, in that it is not "ideal" but seems the only way to go. Thanks for the advice and it looks like I will have quite a bit of work to do on my file making corrections.
Regards,
Steph -
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