The variation in the spelling of RHYS and REES has nothing directly to do
with the British government. What you have to remember is that all parish
records were the responsibility of the clergy and these were, before 1730 or
so, kept in Latin and a very high proportion of clergymen were English.
The name in question was written as RICEUS or RHYSUS but as surnames
developed from the forename, the most common variations were REES, RICE and
RHYS. Which of these was used for a specific parish entry depended entirely
on the whim of the scribe (the incumbent or parish clerk). Even when
censuses were taken from the 19th century on, the enumerators tended to be
English speaking as is evidenced by the quaint spelling of some of the
locations so, unless a RHYS was particularly adamant, his name would tend to
go down as REES and much the same applied to civil registration. So, all in
all, I'm sure, as Martin says, that a standardization of the name to REES
was more due to the general Anglicisation of officialdom in Wales rather
that any formal regulation.
A microcosm of the situation can perhaps be illustrated from my database of
Welsh clergy which covers the period 1540-1835.
From these records I have the following totals of each variant:
Rees - forename - 112
REES - surname - 144
Rice - forename - 200
RICE - surname - 75
Rhys - forename 3
RHYS - surname - 5
I think all this shows that the ancestors of any Welsh person retaining RHYS
as the surname variant were either lucky, very determined or possibly
descended from the Barons of Dynefor who bore the name.
Paul
----- Original Message -----
From: "Martin Briscoe" <mbriscoe(a)zetnet.co.uk>
To: <WLS-BRECONSHIRE-L(a)rootsweb.com>
Sent: Sunday, October 31, 2004 9:15 AM
Subject: RE: [WLS-BRE] English government changing spelling of Welsh
surnames???
It is probably only a matter of time before someone in Brussels
decides to
harmonise the spelling of surnames across the EU.
More seriously I thought it was just the officials perhaps not speaking
Welsh. The same thing happens with surnames in England, you tend to get
more variations in spelling early in the 19th Century and they gradually
standardise with some of the variants either dying out or becoming rarer.
Martin Briscoe
Fort William
M&LFHS | Gwynedd FHS
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Melanie Tucker [mailto:melanieptucker@yahoo.com]
> Sent: 26 October 2004 01:41
> To: WLS-BRECONSHIRE-L(a)rootsweb.com
> Subject: [WLS-BRE] English government changing spelling of
> Welsh surnames???
>
>
> Hello all,
>
> One of my relatives gave me the following explanation for the
> variation in spelling of our Rees/Rhys surname. He spoke of
> the British government requiring people to change the
> spelling of their surnames and "the government's desire to
> analyze all Welsh, Scottish, and Irish surnames."