h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Pounds lost = 67? Have you tried down the back of the sofa?

Joint possession of everything he owns?

Liam.

Well, we are practically married anyway - we do have a fully integrated cd collection

And by the cunning tactic of claiming intense dislike of most of the housey stuff he bought when he was single we are slowly reaching 100%jointly possessed furniture (appart from stuff that is mine of course ).

We are getting to the stage where I'll just have to invite him to a party and he'll get there and wonder why we're standing at the front and why I'm in such a fancy frock...

So what happened before surnames were a common thing? Although I understand that family names for the upper and ruling class have been around for quite a while, I was under the impression that the more populous lower class didn;t really bother with them until the census stuff started happening and some official came round insisting that 'Fred' was not good enough and they had better have a surname to identify them better. Hence the proliferation of Smiths and '-sons or -s' and so forth.
Could this be where the 'Mrs. John the Smith' came from since, without a surname to take, there would be no other way of linking the couple by name (ok, you could call him Mr. Agatha the Seamstress ).

Kelli, I love your idea of inviting him to a party!!

I know this problem of mine may seem trivial, but it really matters to me. I thought of Mrs cause you get treated better and it makes life easier. but I also believe in not always choosing the easy option. I do think its wrong that men are Mr whatever and women are expected to change title and name.

Regarding best man holding bride down, I guess I am wrong on that one. The Victorians did make up a lot of history such as their versions of the middle ages, vikings and druidry to name a view. I believed what I learnt and except that it seems to be wrong.

However the tradition of the father walking the bride down the aisle and handing her over to the groom, isn't that sexist and about ownership? Please be gentle, if you are about to shoot another of my beliefs down in flames!

Oh aye, I forgot that the 10% marriage allowance had been abolished since I last worked at the Inland Revenue.

There's still a NI deduction, though, is there not?

Plus, it's easier to get good-rate loans and mortgages when you're married.

B

yeah, and someone to offload half yer mortgage on

personally i perfer mr, but that probably because im a man

Well I'm due to be 'legally' married (as well as having a pagan handfasting) soon, and this is a subject close to my heart.

I've always been a 'Ms' as I don't like the way that people can assume things about women, but not about men, from their title.

I always swore blind that I would never get married, but now that I find myself in a position to make that commitment, I'm at a loss as to what to do about my surname. I don't particularly like my surname (in fact I wanted to change it legally a few years ago to my mother's maiden name, but got talked out of it), but hate the idea of taking my partner's name just because we're married. It's 'that thing' of being handed from my father to my husband I guess...

We've talked about maybe the both of us changing our surnames, but we haven't come to any firm decision yet. I do like the idea of us having the same name for any children we might have though. The other day we were discussing this, and we jokingly said that any boys we might have could have his surname, and any girls could have mine. Might lead to a bit of confusion at school though.

As for names carrying weight, well my 'official' title is now Dr, so I don't have that problem!

take 'em both and double-barrel it!

...not if you knew both of our surnames!

Yes, that sort of thing can cause problems.. some friends of mine wouldn't consider double barrelling cuz it'd come out with something like Michaels-Tight

Queegle

Ictoan: If you think about it, a lot of surnames originated with the working clasess. Smith is the obvious one. Then there's Carpenter, Shepherd, Wright, Baker, Fletcher (or Arrowsmith), Sawyer, Cook... The list is almost endless, although I suppose Bishop and Knight are a bit more than 'working class'. These names go back a lot further than the first census, which was some time late in the 19th century, AFAIK. The need to differentiate between people of different first names goes back to the days of the first towns, and that's over 1000 years ago.

CD, yup, I guess what I was getting at is that they weren't, if you like, official surnames, they were descriptions of the people. Which is, I guess, why you get place names sometimes as surnames, although that is usually from the aristocracy but dilluted now into the main population. Since people didn;t travel much there wasn't much need for the further identification beyond jobs or vocations. Minbd you, I suppose there isn;t much difference between John the Smith, or John from Red Wood and john Smith or John Redwood. ho hum.
I mentioned the census thing as I heard somewhere that is why there is such paucity of surnames in what were the more rural areas, like wales. The census agents or tax collectors or whatever just couldn't be bothered with trying to find out so they just used the fathers firstname as the persons surname and applied it from then on downwards. I suppose people adopted this.
Hmmm. i think I answered my own question

I remember reading articles once about some danish women who wanted the man to also change his title when he got married. For what purpose I don't know.

Hi Leopardskinfynn
congrats on the wedding and the handfasting

I agree with your sentiments of not wanting to be handed from father to husband.

I guess I need to get re-trained then so I can be a Dr too!

Thanks Kaz.
I take it that congrats are in order for you too, if you've just come back from honeymoon.

The thing is still new enough for me to get a kick out of teling estate agents and the like "It's not Miss ---, its Dr --- actually."

I don't see why we females have a choice of Miss, Mrs, or Ms when men have just Mr. I'd prefer to it just be Ms & Mr. Why should people be able to tell marital status of women and not of men.

As for double-barrelled names. I considered that, but, what about when any children get married, maybe to another double-barrelled name, ending up with a double, double-barrelled surname.

Foxy

It's only what our society has chosen to do.
In Iceland, they don't change their names - women are 's daughter (Dottir). Apparently that has caused a lot of confusion when Icelandic groups book at hotels & the names don't pair off as expected.

When I was married in 1983, Ontario Canada. It was common practice to adopt ones' spouse's name. I did. About twyears later, after changeing my driver's license, etc. I realized that the name I had grown up with (Armour) was my name and should'nt be changed for anyone. I once again changed all of my identification only to find out that my innitial asssumption was wrong. In ord4r to change one's name I should have sought out a lawyer. I am now forever a MS. Armour not a Mrs. Veale. The local school Board still thinks that the father of my children is not married to me. In short, Women are born with the name of therir father (in most cases) Why should we be expected to adopt the name of our spouses just because convention tells us too? In Quebec, Canada, when one get's married. The woman's name remains the same. In order to adopt ones Husband's name you have to apply to the courts. The same ruling applies to any children you might have as a result of the marriage. the name I waa given at birth is ARMOUR and I'm proud of it. K

I think in Iceland the daughters get the name of their mother + dottir.