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Archiver > SOUTH-AFRICA > 2002-12 > 1039057418


From: Lehmkuhl <>
Subject: Re: [ZA] First generation-founder
Date: Wed, 04 Dec 2002 22:03:54 -0500
In-Reply-To: <200212050201.gB521ImU020589@lists5.rootsweb.com>


>Date: Wed, 4 Dec 2002 15:56:04 +0200
>From: "Frans Theunissen" <>
>To:
>
>I do not think there is a problem in labelling the first-born and the
>siblings of a family in a new country as first generation. But I have
>always understood that their father must be the stamvader
>(ancestor).
>
>In my opinion, the ancestor is the one that arrived here, on our
>shores. This could be with wife and children, or he married and had
>issue sometime after arrival here. By one South African convention,
>the ancestor is labelled as "a" and his children b1, b2, b3 etc.
>
>In my own family, we had 4 different ancestors, so they are labelled
>as a1, a2, a3 and a4 in my records. The American notion does not
>make sense to me; I fail to see how the stamvader and first
>generation can be the same. I suppose the American equivalent of
>our stamvader is "founder".
>
>Frans Theunissen
>Cape Town

Hi Frans
Stamvader is family founder (the a in the de Villiers/Pama numbering system).
Ancestor would be voorouers, and only those that you directly descend from.

In the USA, they see the family founder and his family as the first
generation. A few American genealogists consider the family founder as the
immigrant,and only the children born in the USA as the first generation.
South African genealogists see the first children born in South Africa as
the first generation (that would be those numbered b).

Do you mean that the THEUNISSEN family in South Africa stem from 4
different stamvaders?
Only the one that you directly descend from would be your ancestor (unless
all 4 stamvaders were brothers).

__________/\/*******\/\______
Anne Lehmkuhl http://www.rupert.net/~lkool/


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