The ever popular Johann

I have a complaint about the names my husbands German ancestors chose for their kids. First though I should give them credit that unlike my Scandinavian ancestors at least most of the names are recognizable and can be pronounced with my Chicago trained tongue. And better yet they don't sound downright odd or comical. As an example I have a cousin named Odd and an aunt named Gerd. I mean why would you name your child after acid reflux? Solveig, Botvid, Reidar and Gunhild are another handful of names my Scandinavian family thought would be a lovely moniker for their beautiful new baby? I'm sorry,,,if you name your little girl Gunhild, I think it only follows that she will grow up to be short and fat with a hairy upper lip (forgive me great grandma Gunhild).

JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH
"What do you have against Johanns?"

Here is my complaint. It would seem that in my husband's German family only the rare girl isn't named Barbara, Elisabeth, Anne or Christina. The boys? It is much worse. My husband's family is Catholic on his Mom's side and Lutheran on his Dad's. The Catholics tended to choose saints as expected but at least varied their choices some. The Lutherans? Apparently the apostle John (Johann) was the only saint worth naming. The Feick boys are almost all named Johann. They were apparently baptised Johann but then were called by and noted on most other records by their middle name. One boy per family was named strictly Johannes, not Johann, and each Johannes never got a middle name. Go figure. The Feicks were also a pretty prolific bunch.There could be 6-7 Johann's in each generation and then each Johann had more Johann's and so on and Johann and so on and Johann (more borderline punnies by Ranae).



This  is just a FEW of the Johann Feicks, not to mention all the Johanns that don't carry the Feick name.

Johann Georg Feick     7 of these guys
Johann Adam Feick     5 of these guys
Johann Conrad Feick   4 of these guys
Makes my head spin.

The lesson here is be careful Ranae. Make sure you have the correct Johann with the correct parents and the correct dates of birth, baptism, marriage and death. One wrong Johann and every Johann from there on is also wrong. And all the Johann Feicks that moved on to America? That's a whole other story and a different line of Johanns, not ours, so I'll let their descendants worry about them.

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