Welsh Patronymics- Background

Administrators

Surnames

Adams, Alexander, Andrews, Bevan, Bowen, Charles, Davies, Davis, Dennis, Dix, Edmunds, Edwards, Elkins, Ellis, Evans, George, Gough, Griffiths, Hanks, Harris, Hayes, Henry, Hopkins, Howell, Hughes, James, Jeffries, Jenkins, Johns, Jones, Lewis, Llewelyn, Lloyd, Matthews, Meredith, Morgan, Morris, Nichols, Owen, Parry, Peters, Phillips, Powell, Price, Pritchard, Probert, Pugh, Richards, Roberts, Rogers, Simmons, Thomas, Vaughan, Watkins, Wilkins, Wilks, Williams, Wynne

Background

The Welsh Patronymics project was officially begun on December 6, 2002. The project was designed for the patronymic style surnames (Williams, Jones, and Roberts, just to name a few) which are found in Wales. The reason for this is that the patronymic surname system persisted in Wales much longer than in many other parts of Europe, as recently as 1813 in some areas. What that means is that the son of a man named Robert Williams might have been called Hugh Robert or Hugh Roberts, so did not have Williams as his surname.

Welsh patronymic surnames take on three forms:

1. A masculine name as it is (particularly common for masculine names ending in “s”, though not always that way). Examples: James, Thomas, Lewis, George, Owen, Griffith, Morgan.

2. A masculine name followed by a possessive “s.” Examples: Williams, Jones, Evans, Edwards, Matthews, Roberts, Hughes, Harris (son of Harry), Davies or Davis (son of David/Dafydd).

3. A masculine name beginning with the prefix “ap” or “ab” (the “a” is usually dropped in the modern form). Examples: Powell (ap Howell), Pritchard (ap Richard), Price (ap Rhys), Bowen (ab Owen), Bevan (ab Evan), Pugh (ap Hugh).

Project Stats

Statistic Type Count
Combined GEDCOMs Uploaded 68
Distinct mtDNA Haplogroups 92
Distinct Y-DNA Confirmed Haplogroups 35
Distinct Y-DNA Predicted Haplogroups 14
Family Finder 139
Maternal Ancestor Information 310
mtDNA 214
mtDNA Full Sequence 83
mtDNA Plus 154
mtDNA Subgroups 13
Paternal Ancestor Information 411
Predicted Y-DNA Haplogroups 163
Total Members 504
Unpredicted Y-DNA Haplogroups 5
Unreturned Kits 12
WTY 4
Y-DNA Deep Clade (After 2008) 85
Y-DNA Deep Clade (Prior to 2008) 52
Y-DNA Subgroups 69
Y-DNA111 60
Y-DNA12 415
Y-DNA25 359
Y-DNA37 331
Y-DNA67 215