In a message dated 5/31/2007 12:19:43 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time,  
[log in to unmask] writes:

In  Ireland where I am from Gaelic names were systematically changed to 
English  versions by government officials during English rule. So my family name Ó  
Gabhláin was translated to Forkan ('gabhlóg' was a 'fork'). The relationship  
of the two names is not readily recognizable. In other cases the names were  
just anglicized, so that a similar-sounding name was chosen. Neither approach  
seems to have been used in your father-in-law's  case!



I expect the English changed many names, not to mention relocated many  
people. I had often wondered how one of my ancestors was born in Dublin, Ireland  
with the name Armstrong. Ironically, a Spanish American friend reported her  
family name of "O'Donnell" became Spanish when the English burned the family  
castle and the family fled to Spanish Galicia (whose Gaelic language roots  
remain in question) for safety. This Irish Spaniard (now an American  citizen) 
reported the English routinely rounded up Scottish troublemakers and  posted them 
in the former homes of Irish troublemakers. Of course, I might add  that 
Danish and Norwegian Vikings established Dublin as a slave trading center  long 
before it fell into Irish rule. This makes the Ellis Island tales seem tame  by 
comparison.
 
Ron May
Legacy 106, Inc.



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