(This says the Johan/Johann in front of David's name was a spirtual
name...we wouldn't call him by that.It seems...John was only named John.
(Johannes)) so as we suspected..."Dutchman" was a nickname...
...............................................................
For those of you who are researching your German ancestors in Rowan
County or elsewhere, the following information on German naming customs
or patterns may be of some help.? I have copied and pasted the following
information from the following?link:?
http://www.kerchner.com/germname.htm
18th Century PA German Naming Customs
At baptism, if two given names were given to the child, the first given
name was a spiritual, saint's name. The second given name was the
secular or call name, i.e., "rufnamen", which is the name the person was
known by, both within the family and to the rest of the world. This
custom was originally adopted in Germanic and other regions in Europe
from Roman Catholic tradition and continued by the Protestants in their
baptismal naming customs. The immigrants from these areas brought the
custom with them to Pennsylvania.
The spiritual name, usually to honor a favorite saint, was used
repeatedly and was usually given to all the children of that family of
the same gender. Thus the boys would be Johan Adam ...., Johan George
....., etc., or Philip Peter ...., Philip Jacob ...., etc. Girls would
be named Anna Barbara ...., Anna Margaret ...., etc., or Maria Elizabeth
...., Maria Catherine ...., etc. But after baptism, these people would
not be known as John, Philip, Anna, or Maria, respectively. They would
instead be known by what we would think of now as their middle name,
which was their secular name. Thus these people would be known
respectively as Adam, George, Peter, Jacob, Barbara, Margaret,
Elizabeth, and Catherine in legal and secular records. For males, the
saint's name Johan or John for Saint John was particularly heavily used
by many German families, but also Saint George was used by some families
for male children. The child's secular name was really John, if and only
if, at baptism he was named only John, usually spelled as Johannes, with
no second given name. The name John spelled as Johannes is rarely seen
spelled as Johannes as a spiritual name, i.e., you rarely will see the
name at baptism recorded as Johannes Adam ....., etc. It is generally
always found spelled as Johan or Johann when used as a spiritual name.
Thus, you find the spiritual name of John recorded as Johan Adam .....
or Johann Adam ....., not Johannes Adam
..... .
Many researchers, new to German names, who find a baptism of an
individual with a name such as Johan Adam ....., thus mistakenly spend a
lot of time looking for a John ....., in legal and census records, when
he was known after baptism, to the secular world, as Adam ..... . The
use of Saint John was the most common example of this custom, but Saint
George was often used too. And thus one would find children in a family
named George Heinrich ......, George Jacob ......, George Frederick
....., and of course simply George ..... by itself. In these examples
the secular or call names would respectively be Heinrich, Jacob,
Frederick, and George.
The term "Senior" and "Junior" following a name did not necessarily
imply a father and son relationship, as it does now. It could have been
an uncle and nephew who had the same name and lived near each other. It
could be a grandfather and a grandchild living together, where the
father has died. It could even be two unrelated individuals with the
same name but of different ages who lived near each other. So to help
friends and business associates keep track of who-was-who in their
discussions and records, they added on the "Sr." or "Jr." which
merely
meant the older and the younger, respectively. Frequently the secular
name given to the child was also the same as the secular given name of
one of the baptismal sponsors for the child. Said baptismal sponsors
frequently were close relatives but also could be close and trusted
friends and neighbors.