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From: "Deborah Fox" <>
Subject: [HWE] Surname confusion LEGRANDE
Date: Wed, 20 Dec 2006 08:55:48 -0500
References: <mailman.229.1166602013.4789.huguenots-walloons-europe@rootsweb.com>


Thank you everyone for the information about LANG/LARGE. I never knew that
"lang" was derived from "long" and that the name may have referred to a tall
person. Growing up, my family always joked that the name Large came about
because the ancestors were tall and big. But my research has shown that
Large (as well as the Large family) originated in France, and comes from
largesse. I have read that in the middle ages, a tall or big Englishman was
called "Longfellow" or "Long," not Large...... A "large" part of the
difficulty in researching a name like "Large" (and I won't go into the
difficulty of growing up with such a surname LOLOL or trying to combine it
with something like Fox, I guess it could have been worse LOL) is that using
search engines can be impossible at times, turning up zillions of hits. My
other difficulty is when researching French records, I am not always quite
sure what other names might be offshoots of Large or LeLarge. There are some
Large researchers in Ireland who claim that there were Huguenot Large's who
became LEGRAND and then GRAND in Ireland. So far, I have not found any
support for this theory at all. I believe most of LeGRANDs in Ireland were
of French descent, but not Huguenot...If anyone thinks otherwise, I would be
interested in finding out how the aurnames GRAND and LARGE might be related
in French? A very happy holiday season to all on the list and a great 2007!
Debbie


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