FRANCE surnames: geography and time periods

[JaneyCanuck]

http://www.geopatronyme.com/

The website is in French but it is relatively simple. Stick the surname in question in the search box and click the "Valider" button -- or just hit the "Enter" key.

You will get a map showing the distribution of the surname for a particular period.

You can click on the list beside the map showing time periods, e.g. 1891-1915, and the number of "nais.": naissances, or births, in that period.

Unfortunately, it starts only in 1891, and goes to 1990.

But it can give you an idea of the likely geographical source of a name. For example, searching in the earliest time period there for Canada's famous Tremblay shows 333 births concentrated in the northwest with none at all in most of France's départements.

For anybody with English or other foreign births in France in the last 120 years, they would stick out like a sore thumb.

I've kept hoping the site will move farther back in time, but in several years, that has not happened.

[Billyblue]

Interesting.
thanks
Dawn M