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Understanding Quebec Catholic Records (view source)
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Since parishes are communities of people, their size and location evolved, according to the movement, the growth and the density of the population. Parishes started as missions in remote areas, served by the priest of another parish, before becoming a parish of their own. As a parish becomes too large in population, or when the parishioners begin to find that the church is simply too far from where they live, other parishes are detached from the original one. Therefore, the name of the parish in the records does not necessarily reflect the geographical location we would assign to them nowadays. | Since parishes are communities of people, their size and location evolved, according to the movement, the growth and the density of the population. Parishes started as missions in remote areas, served by the priest of another parish, before becoming a parish of their own. As a parish becomes too large in population, or when the parishioners begin to find that the church is simply too far from where they live, other parishes are detached from the original one. Therefore, the name of the parish in the records does not necessarily reflect the geographical location we would assign to them nowadays. | ||
Unlike the civil land organization, which has evolved through time, parishes have remained constant, with only their geographical and population sizes changed. Some parishes did change name, either following the will of their parishioners (example: Saint-Olivier becoming Saint-Mathias), or to identify them more precisely as one or more parishes had the same saint as patron. | |||
===Names=== | ===Names=== | ||
The spelling of both the first names and surnames of people mentioned in the records is very variable. It depends on the degree of literacy of the priests, some spelling according to the "sound" of the name, rather than using a more standard form. The spelling is also influenced by regional variations and by its evolution through time. Given that almost all the French Canadian people were illiterate, it is rarely possible to see how they themselves would spell their name. And the few who could write, were often just trying to copy, using very bad handwriting, what the priest had written in the record. | |||
When building a family tree, it is therefore a good habit to adopt a standard spelling for the time, based on the frequency with which a certain spelling occurs in the records of the same period. Trying to note all the variations found can quickly become fastidious, and can hide relationships of people. This good practice also allows to reflect the evolution of certain names (like ''Magdeleine'', in use in the 17th, 18th and early 19th century, closer to the Latin form ''Magdelena'', which is written ''Madeleine'' nowadays). | |||
====French accents==== | |||
Starting in the 18th century, the French language in Quebec started to be written with diacritical marks, or accents, on vowels. These are the "acute" accent (like é), the "grave" accent (like à, è or ù), the "circumflex" accent (like â, ê, î, and ô), the dieresis (like ë and ï). These indicate a different pronunciation for the vowels: the "acute" accent rendering a "closed" sound like "é" (hay), an "open sound like "è" (hell), or an elongated sound like "ê" (hair). The dieresis mark like "ë" served to indicate that the vowel need to be pronounced separately from the preceding one, as in "Noël" (no ell, and not, nwell, as o followed by e would normally be pronounced). | |||
The letter "c" also started to be accompanied by a "cedilla", like ç, to indicate that the sound is sibilant like an "s", and not hard like a "k". Example: François is pronounced "fransswah" and not "frankwah". | |||
Before that time, the letter "s" was used instead of the accents, appearing after the vowel, depending the following consonant. For example, the surname "Létourneau" used to be written "Lestourneau", "Lemaître" as "Lemaistre", and the first name "Étienne" as "Estienne" (again. closer to the Latin form "Stephanum"). | |||
===="Dit" names==== | |||
===Events=== | ===Events=== | ||
====Baptisms==== | ====Baptisms==== | ||
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====Burials==== | ====Burials==== | ||
<references /> | <references /> | ||