Dutch Naming Standardization - Broken into SubCategories

Jarrett Ross (112-1701-241-22) in response to Jarrett Ross,
I share with you that ideally less confusion is a good thing and I appreciate your explanations. However, I beg to differ, for each search is unique and each family is unique. Because of the diaspora, because of the history of Jews being persecuted in many and some more and some less pervasive ways, depending on where they lived, on the current economic climate, on basic racism against "otherness" (just to name a few, and not only the Holocaust), there were many creative solutions found to alter perception of "Jewness" in Europe from the Middle Ages and way up and into the nineteenth century ... for example, early nineteenth century Denmark,in german Jews (ie ashkénaze) were considered poor, unskilled/uneducated and hence unworthy, whereas the Jews from "Portugal" were considered educated, skilled, sophisticated and they were welcomed and many became purveyors to the Court in a variety of councils and trades... two issues can easily be observed here already: 1. at the time, there was little ability to establish real proof whether the jews in question came from Spain, or from Portugal, or 2. whether they actually came from an altogether different place. This lead to a great deal of creativity in naming conventions, sometimes with the goal of actually hiding (from the authorities) the geographical origins in order to obtain acceptance, right of passage or to establish work, family, school, synagogue etc.

You can appreciate the effect that the broad strokes you describe would have on such folks.
Also, about Hebrew-language. I may not have understood accurately your intent, but I would argue that Hebrew-names or information would be useful in BOTH Hebrew and phonetic language (using roman letters) ....just think about the many Conversos, the Marranos and even secular Jews who may not be versed in Hebrew : why on Earth would anyone want to exclude others in their quest for understanding origins, differences and belonging, just because they do not Hebrew?
I do not regret that there is no hard and fast methodology; genealogy will remain complex and complicated, reflecting the world and the times our families have endured. To me, that is a richness that I would not want to see get lost regardless of how noble your intent may be.
Thank you for your attention.
J

Private User, Thank you for your response. While I agree that the nuances of each Sephardi family change depending on where they lived, there are many families with long lineages within the Portuguese Jewish Community of Amsterdam (a very specific and well documented community with a well-established system of governance) and many of within the community spent their entire lives within the community. Even more so, we have the documentation of the community in inventory file 334 at the Amsterdam Archives which contains the Escamoth books (decisions by the Mahamed), Ketubahs, Circumicisions, Tax Lists, Gabay documents, and many other documents specific to the PJC. Some families can establish whether they came from Portugal or Spain (especially those with Attestations), not all can, but whether or not they came from one or the other Western Sephardi Jews referred to their communities as part of the Nation of Portuguese Jews (Hebrews of the Portuguese Nation). It is just a catch-all term for Sephardi Jews in the western communities such as Amsterdam, Livorno, London, Tunisia, Hamburg, etc. Just going to the archive you can even see the community is called in Dutch 'Archief van de Portugees-Israëlietische Gemeente' https://archief.amsterdam/inventarissen/inventaris/334.nl.html

The Ashkenazi community was seen differently by the locals but they too had an established community with multiple Synagogues and some of these records are also available, although not in as much as the PJC). That is why I am saying we need to set a naming standardization for the PJC and a separate standard for Dutch Ashkenazi Jews. Their naming traditions were different and this should be noted in any naming standardization of Dutch Jews.

So I'm not talking about Jews as a whole, I am talking about those who lived in these specific communities that were part of the Netherlands.

In terms of using Hebrew letters and Roman letters, there is a specific category available for each language where the alphabet of that language should be used. The Roman letter transliteration of the Hebrew name should be included in the 'also known as' category. The actual Hebrew spelling isn't always known as the name can sometimes be included in non-Hebrew documents without the Hebrew letters. So this is not a matter of excluding one (we want to include all noted names), it's a matter of what naming field do we put each spelling into. I should also note that Marranos is the derogatory term for Conversos, Marrano being a 'pig', so just using the word Conversos is all you need.

Thanks for starting this discussion although I'm not sure that there is any definitive way of dealing with name variants and am worried that an attempt by us to standardise could have the negative effect of blocking searches. Anything I can do to help, I will.

First of all a question (pardon my ignorance). Does geni not have the possibility of Soundex searching? That would at least help with spelling variants although it would not solve the problem of the form of the name.

Next, to illustrate the problem as I see it, late last year at my first meeting of the Jewish Genealogy Society of Great Britain I found myself in a room with seven strangers and discovered that I had genealogical links to five of them and DNA links to two. One has the surname Montanjees, one of several variants of the Portugues surname Montanhes in which the name has been transliterated into Dutch. There are, however, in my blood line, family members with the name spelled: Montanhes, Montañes, Montanyes, Montanjies, Montagnes, Mantagnes, Montagne, de la Montagne (and others). I am currently trying to find links to the great 12th Catalan writer Muntaner, which I suspect will prove to be another variant. They all appear in parts of the Dutch family and some, I have managed to establish, appear on documentation although I have not even thought of starting a gravestone check. I have not yet unearthed any who have translated the name (which would have been the patronymic of montanha/mountain as Mountain in English (non patronymic - would not expect a patronymic version in English) or Bergsohn/Bergzon/Bjergsen/Bjergson/Bjergsson (patronymics in German, Dutch, Danish, Swedish) or non patronmics without the respective endings. Tracking the routes by which the Montanjees/Montanjies/Montanjes travelled from Portugal to Netherlands, I find them having moved through Spain, France, Italy, Greece, Turkey, Belgium. So far I have not found (but I have not been looking for) an Italian version (possibly along the lines of Montagnese/Montagnesi or a Greek version ending in is or idis, or a Croatian version ending in ic. My question here is, how, in a search for some kind of standardisation, do we deal with these. All of the different variants were brought into and used officially in Holland. I would not dream of attempting to substitute names (all the spellings I cited above are in use in Holland and many other countries) which people are using or even which they have used. The best I might hope for is to have a 'variant matching box' offering search matching with other spellings. Last week I did a search for my seventh cousin Ray Montanjees, through his father David De Abraham Levy Montanjees (an example of a patronymic, a double surname and De in place of van because that bit of the family had come in from France. But some of the same family arrived in Amsterdam from Turkey with the surname de Mantagnes (a distortion of the French spelling), while other members arrived from Venice and Livorno with Spanish and Portugues spellings. I would even hesitate to call the Levy a surname since nobody else in the Montanjees family tree seems to use it as a name.

Summing that up, we have people arriving in the Netherlands with spelling variants and form variants of Spanish and Portuguese names that reflect their journeys through and stays in mutliple countries. While striving to make things more easily searchable, we do need to respect the names they have brought with them.

And what do we do where people used multiple names including variants of their own name? I am thinking of the example of one relative, the Spanish-born Dutch Jew, living in Belgium and Germany who, under the name Gabriel Milan, was sent by the King of Denmark to be Governor of the Danish West Indies in the 1680s (and hanged in Denmark). He used that and a Portuguese version Gavriel Milão but also his original name which was Don Tebary de Cordoba. All three appear in his Wikipedia entry. What do we do with them? I am convinced that the Milan/Milão was a name he adopted as a code from the Hebrew mila/milon (word or dictionary) but I won't go into the details here but I believe (and this seems to be fairly common) that his chosen name is a statement; Gabriel, God is my hero, Milan, I am a man of the word or of the dictionary. His descendants who stayed in Scandinavia retained the surname Milan. Those who did not chose other names. What should appear as the name? What should appear as the 'also known as'? If his birth name was Tebary de Cordoba, de Cordoba is not a patronymic but it could simply be an indication of where he came from or it could be part of a title. Because he moved around so much, I wonder how easy it will be to find a paper trail. There is certainly evidence that he used Gabriel Milan in official Danish business. He appears to have used Gavriel Milão in Hamburg and Glückstadt (so Germany and Schleswig-Holstein). I do not know where he used Tebary de Cordoba and if he used Don was it a title?

I use these just as illustrations of the complications and challenges.

One other challenge that I have been dealing with (a name that I don't think will come into this category of Dtuch naming but is something I have been working on for over 40) years is the simple Spanish surname Cerda mostly in Spain and Latin America but also in Australia. I was lucky enough to get a church family tree for ancestors and some descendants of the person I was searching for. Even in one generation in his own family, some of his siblings are Serda, others are Cerda and there is a series of different accents and family tree includes Seda (apparently a not uncommon Sephardic name) and Ceda. When I set to work searching, I came up with 204 spelling variants. For my own searches and for storing my results, I have opted to take whatever spelling the person concerned appeared to be using or was being used by that person in either their family or professional life. I know that doesn't help.

If we can come up with a naming convention I will certainly do my best to go along with it but I think we may have to find a way for names conforming to the convention go alongside the names that we find people using.

Hello Bernard, there are already many tools in place on Geni to account for people who had name variants based on their family history. Most notably the multiple languages option for names - https://help.geni.com/hc/en-us/articles/229704207-How-do-I-add-mult.... I am unsure about soundex searching but I am quite certain that is not something available in the Geni system.

For families where the surname changes depending on location, I believe the default spelling should be decided on an individual basis (especially considering what that person used during their life). So for Gabriel Milan I would argue we should place Gavriel Milão under the Portuguese language option with Don Tebary de Cordoba in the 'also known as' field. But this is just my opinion and why I wanted to bring this to those researching the Dutch Jewish tree as we all know variations are too common in these trees and coming up with a standardization will optimize the ability to search.

The standardization isn't to limit what names should be put into the profile (as you stated, every documented name variant should be noted in some way - often the also known as field), the standardization is to decide what names take precedent in becoming the 'default name'. If someone was born in Amsterdam and then moved to London where they changed the name spelling (such as the Moscou family who changed to Moscow) then does the birth name take precedent as default or do we put it under the Dutch language option with the English spelling of Moscow under default since English is the automatic default and Moscow was what was used in an 'English community' (although there are nuances with this you can learn about here - https://help.geni.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/222091767-How-to-cha...).

Another thing I should note is whatever we set will be considered guidelines and not necessarily hard-fast rules. Each family and each person is a special case unto themselves and depending on where the family came from or ended up outside of the Dutch jewish communities will most likely change the naming conventions. A lot of the things to consider that you bring up are at the heart of why I believe this needs to be standardized - optimize collaboration, ability to research further, and ability to find a specific profile in the tree easily. Plus it seems that every few months a new researcher pops up out of the woodwork and starts changing all the names to their own personal preferences, so it will make it easier to get everyone on the same page with a logical explanation as to why we chose whatever standardizations.

Not that this should be any form of guidance but I actually get pleasure from discovering name variants and how people have tried to make names from one language and culture fit into another language and culture, so what many people view as an annoyance or a nuisance, I consider fun.

There is another curiosity in Spanish which was brought home to me this weekend when I was giving some friends/colleagues from Barcelona a planing-related tour of London. They tend to translate first names into Spanish so Karl Marx is referred to as Carlos Marx (but not Marquez) in Spanish and Carles Marx in Catalan (I was reminded of that as we drove past the cemetery where he is buried).

And I was telling of them of a recent discovery (not one that I wanted) that a politician who was well known (and a source of shame) in the 1950s and 1960s was born Jewish in London with the surname Nunes Nabarro (no dash) but subsequently became an anti-immigration Catholic and dropped the Nunes (too foreign?) was a sixth cousin thrice removed. His siblings kept both names.

One interesting thing about him to me is the issues his name raises. In Spain the name Nuñez Nabarro is associated with one of the largest property companies. On their billboards and hoardings they go by the name of Nuñez y Nabarro (in the rest of Spain) and Nunez i Nabarro (in Catalunya). But I just checked and they are using Nuñez y Navarro as a first surname because on official documents they appear as Nuñez y Nabarro Espronceda (Nuñez is a patronymic of Nuño, Nabarro is a name from Nabarra (Navarre) and Espronceda is a place name (a small town in Navarre). I have not come across the surname Nunes Nabarro with 'y' or 'i' in any of the Dutch family so that bit of Spanish naming convention may not have made it to there or subsequently to the English speaking world.

This Thursday evening the Jewish Genealogy Society of Great Britain is holding a webinar titled 'Onomastics for Genealogy, Names, Naming Patterns & More'. Perhaps there will be some useful information and potential guidance there. I will raise some of these issues if I get the chance.

for me the biggest problen is when familys used iberian naming conventions (which does not seem to have happened too much in london) and literally they all use different family names

They do all use different family names but that is why we need to come up with a standardization of which names take precedent as the default and which ones go into other categories. The main piece of our standardization is really what documentation of the name spelling shows precedent. Again, this is not to make hard-fast rules but to set guidelines to better clean-up the tree and make it easier for all of us to work together.

Some other folks who I would be interested in hearing from on this who do a lot of editing within these trees - Private User, Private User, Elsje Vos, Jacob Marrache, Private User.

I do want to clarify as well that I do not believe there should be a standardization for the Sephardi diaspora as a whole - there is too much variation on name spelling and surname inheritance. I am solely looking at creating a standardization for the PJC and a standardization of the Dutch Askenazi communities.

I have several Dutch Askenazi linea in My ancestors, what I mostly do is, for the profile the Civil namens and the Jiddisch name in the aka Field.
At this way you can search at the Commune Civil records, and in my case at Dutch Jews Akevoth

This is what Mr. Ross sends, whith revering to being a Curator:

" Naming Standards on Geni - Dutch Jews
Tussen Jarrett Ross (112-1701-241-22) en Elsje Vos

Antwoorden Doorsturen Bewaren Verwijderen Als spam markeren Demp

Jarrett Ross (112-1701-241-22)
19/4/2019 om 5:09 's ochtends
Hello Elsje,

There are naming standards on Geni and you keep reverting my edits back to clean up the family trees. The information from the marriage documents are include in the profile but the naming standardization on Geni specifically says not to include multiple writing variations in one field such as "'Zimmetje' Simha/Simcha Salomon Abandalac/Bendelak" (https://www.geni.com/projects/Coalition-for-the-Standardization-of-...).

For Portuguese Jews in Amsterdam such as Simha Abendalac they had Dutch variations of their names such as hers of Zimmetje Bendalak which would be found in Civil Registers (such as the documents you referenced). That is why the name Zimmetje Bendalak is placed under the Dutch naming variation - https://help.geni.com/hc/en-us/articles/229704207-How-do-I-add-mult.... Having the different names entered into different fields instead of the clunky "'Zimmetje' Simha/Simcha Salomon Abandalac/Bendelak" which also causes problems for the search engine optimization on Geni to allow other users to find the proper profile. Any other variations on spellings can either be added to their proper language or added to the 'Also Known As' field with each name separated by commas.

No information is being left out, it is being reordered to optimize Geni.

Due to the constant differences of everyone's field entering style within the Dutch Jewish family trees I have started a discussion about this. I suggest you give your opinion - https://www.geni.com/discussions/195129.

Best,
Jarrett Ross
Volunteer Geni Curator"

... and then makes is impossible for me to add info into a profile (which was not added to the tree by him, but by someone else) by making himself master of the profile:
Simha Salomon Abandalac .
Is this the way one individual on Geni works for David Prins, rvk, Elsje Vos, Jacob Marrache, Gary Marsh Koven ? The rules mr. Ross wants us to live by, are impossible to work with. And show no respect to our historical trees, in which names can always be found, and the stories in each periodical by adding as much info we can find. It makes Geni much more fun and interesting !! And that makes Geni popular, and is growing in The Netherlands,and I presume in other countries around the world too.

Elsje, I find it a bit insulting that you say I show no respect for historical trees when the entire basis of what I am doing, especially this discussion, is to optimize the tree and make it easier for everyone to work together. I have locked that one profile temporarily because I had edited that specifically to clean up the names and you immediately reverted it back to what I had changed it from. I did not want to get into an edit war and decided it was best to lock the profile until you responded as I have sent similar messages to you in the past with no response. As explained in the message I sent you, I have placed each name variation into its proper language setting (Zimmetje Bendalak going into the Dutch language setting, the default being Simha Salomon Abendalac, and all other variations in the 'also known as' field). I don't see how this shows no respect to the family tree, in fact I think it shows more respect by breaking down the subtle nuances of the differences in naming variations instead of lumping them all together.

As I stated in the message, no information is being left out. This is why Geni has created this multiple name fields with different languages.

If you can please explain why these guidelines I am trying to set are impossible to live by then maybe we can figure out something better. The point of this discussion is to work together to create the best system for all of us. I've explained the way I believe it is best and have given examples about why I believe that, including links to already set standardization guidelines. If you don't agree then please explain what you think would be best and why. There are a lot of people who connect to the Dutch Jewish family trees and there are a lot of people, including pretty much everyone in this discussion, who spend hours every day working on it. So instead of having dozens of different ways to enter in these multiple variations of names, let's all work together to create some sort of system that works for all of us (basically using a similar approach as the overall Geni naming conventions - https://wiki.geni.com/index.php/Naming_Conventions).

To lay out even further what I believe the standardization should be, here is breakdown of each point;

1. Members of The Portuguese Jewish Community of Amsterdam (Portugees-Israëlietische Gemeente) -

a. The birth name registered in the community birth records or circumcision records would take precedent as the default name. These records mostly being found in inventory 334 (https://archief.amsterdam/inventarissen/inventaris/334.nl.html).

b. If there is a Dutch Civil record (Birth, Marriage, Death, Ondertrouw, Bevolking, etc) with an alternate spelling, that should be placed under the Dutch language setting or in the 'also known as' field. If there are only Dutch Civil records available then that name spelling will be set as default until an alternate PIC record or other birth record is located.

c. If someone is born outside of the community then the birth name from the country of origin will take precedent as the default unless it is spelled using a non-Roman alphabet, in which case it will be placed under the appropriate language fields.

d. Converso aliases should be placed under either the Portuguese or Spanish language tab depending on the place of origin.

e. I'm unsure whether or not to include patronymics in the default name and if so, do we include just the name or also include the tussenvoegsel (i.e. 'Abraham van Joseph' or 'Abraham v Joseph' versus 'Abraham Josephs')? Along with that, do we include the patronymic in the first name field or the middle name? Either way, the entire patronymic should be included in the 'Also Known As' field along with alternate versions (Abraham ben Joseph, Abraham de Joseph, etc.).

f. Any Hebrew spellings of a name should be placed under the Hebrew language setting with a transliterated spelling using the Latin alphabet placed in the 'also known as' field.

2. Dutch Ashkenazi Community -

a. If any birth records from within one of the communities can be located that name will take precedent with the civil record spelling going under the Dutch variation. If only the civil records can be found, then those spellings would take precedent. Basically the same thing as the PJC.

b. The big question I am unsure about is if any standardization can be set for those born before the adoption of surnames in 1811. Even the majority of birth records, circumcision records, and Ondertrouws I have found for Dutch Ashkenazi Jews before 1811 seem to solely rely on a patronymic naming style with only a handful having some sort of surname (often a Cohen or Levi distinction). Along with that, the same questions about patronymics with the PJC apply here as well. Opinions on this would be great.

c. Any Hebrew spellings of a name should be placed under the Hebrew language setting but I am unsure if the transliteration using the Latin alphabet should be considered as the 'default' English name (since the Hebrew name is most likely how they were referred to when they were born) or if it should be placed in the 'also known as' field.

These are the standardizations I believe we can set in reference to these specific population groups that will be best in the long run. In my opinion, these guidelines allow for the flexibility of naming variations while still setting enough of a guideline that it will optimize the family trees. If anyone disagrees with these I am very curious to hear your opinion and your thoughts on what might work best. If you agree, please let me know as well.

Jarrett my cuz 😉you’re awesome for all of your dedication

Thank you Gabrielle!

Something does need to be done as an example the Ashkenaz adopted family names around 1811, but if you look at the trees the creators have added the family name to earlier generations.

Hi Jarrett. It certainly looks like a thankless task but if it's going to help make the process of finding people and improving connections better I'm all in favour. Would it be possible for you to give us ten or a dozen examples of what you currently see as problems (which some of us may just see as the quirks of family history) and your ideas for dealing with and unifying them? When we see the patterns, in addition to helping clarify the situation for us, we might have ideas to suggest.
At last Thursday's very interesting webinar on naming, the example was given of the name Abramovic for which 493 different potential spellings had been identified and that was not even addressing the different and conflicting naming convention of Spanish and Portuguese multiple surnames and what happens to the 'de', 'da', 'van', 'von' and other particles that some of our names have picked up and/or discarded along the way.

Hi Jarrett. Just spotted your youtube video on advanced naming and about to watch it.

Well done. After watching that I have a technological suggestion but it's one that will need to be developed and will probably take a lot of extra memory resources. Would it be possible to display a profile's name variants in a scrolling system?

In other words if someone has put in a name (let's say a Spanish name that has been changed to French while the family was living in France) which then changes on arrival in another country (let's say Netherlands) and the person then adopts a Dutch name (or more than one), it would be great if, for someone with a number of different names by which they are known, they could scroll sequentially and users could stop the scroll at variants they recognise.

It would also be immensely helpful where someone has a name that is really common in one language but quite rare in another, since starting searches with common names can be really daunting if you don't have enough information to identify the person you are looking for. That give me the chance to ask, where do you go to send technical suggestions?

Thanks

Bernard

I find it rather ridicule, and I think rigid, to follow rules mentioned by Mr. Ross.
My reaction on the last post by Mr. Miller: I have this nice example to check out to make a point in the impossible-to-work-with rules suggested for an average Geni-user when finding info and follow-up info:
As a user I trust to find more info in the complete name of a person, to be able to just or I'm dealing with the right person. Dutch,Tjech, Italian or English users, it does'nt matter who is looking for a person. Church-rules are subordinate. Which f.i. already are
implemented in the administration of the Port.Isr. Cemetery (I believe with over a 30.000 graves with their 30.000 corresponding names!): names on the stones are the names given at one's birth and count as the name used on the day of one's dead. On the stone can be added the name of one's husband or wife. A piece of cake, right?!
Now comes a harder part: please check this profile:Simcha Querido
... and ... https://archief.amsterdam/inventarissen/inventaris/5001.nl.html#OTR...
... and tries to add Simcha her husband's profile to this document, next puzzle for an average user of Geni ... and find this name without his father's name Jacob ....:
"Profielen (Toevoegen): Raphael Nunes Vaz (112)."
Is there anybody still laughing under the discussion participants ??

I opt for the solution: Put first name of father and grandfather into the true name of person profiled. Example from/for the above, simple and understandable for the whole world:
Raphael Jacob Abraham Nunes Vaz. And for whishfull-thinkers: plus the 112.
Geni has it's unique 'name-code', and is no longer a copycat-site of a hundred other family-tree-sites.

Warm regards to you discussion participants, Mrs. E. Vos

Much appreciated Bernard! For those unfamiliar with the video Bernard is referring to, here is a link -https://youtu.be/sgs1PgMK4NE. For the technical suggestion you can start a general discussion, just go to https://www.geni.com/discussions and scroll to the bottom of the page where you can begin that discussion. Are you talking about a scrolling system in the Tree view? Might be a good idea, since only one name will display in the tree view (although you can change the options with it - https://www.geni.com/blog/geni-tips-customize-your-name-preferences...).

As for some examples for the Portuguese Jewish Community profiles;
1. Simha Salomon Abendalac - Simha Salomon Abandalac

Simha was born in London but we currently do not have records for her from England (not to say they don't exist, no one has connected them to her profile on Geni yet), so the name which would take default is that which is supplied through the PJC documents. I have connected two so far; a burial record showing her as Simha de Ishac aCohen Belinfante and her Beth Haim record. There is a Dutch variation of her name - Zimmetje Bendalac - which is seen in her Ondertrouw record as provided by Elsje Vos in Simha's about me section (https://archief.amsterdam/inventarissen/inventaris/5001.nl.html#A23...).

From this information I used the default first name as Simha, default middle name as her patronymic Salomon, and her birth name as Abendalac. Even though they are in Amsterdam, she takes her husband's surname in many documents and because of this I believe we should also include a variation of Cohen Belinfante / aCohen Belinfante in the last name field. I have placed Zimmetje under the Dutch first name field and Bendalak under the Dutch birth name field.

2. Jeudit Isaac de Mattos (Barzilay) - Jeudit Isaac Barzilay

Same thing with Jeudit although I have already put de Mattos in the last name section with Barzilay in the birth name. As well, de Matos is put in the Dutch last name field and Barzilaij in the Dutch birth name field as that is the variation from the Ondertrouw.

3. Jacob Nunes Vaz - Jacob Nunes Vaz (11)

For Jacob I have his default birth name as Nunes Vais because the death record from Livorno shows his name spelled as such and Livorno is the place of his birth. I have Nunes Vaas under the Dutch last name field because that is on the Ondertrouw for Jacob. Then for the display name I also have it to just Jacob Nunes Vaz (11) because this is how family documents list him (including family trees from the 19th century) and the numbers being the numbering system for the Nunes Vaz family (which I mention in my video). Since we have the ketubah for Jacob we have his Hebrew name which is entered into the Hebrew section using Hebrew characters but the English transliteration (Yaakov ben Avraham Nunes Vas) is written in the 'also known as' field under English(default).

Will have to look for good Ashkenazi examples but I think the same ideas as the PJC give a pretty good idea of about the same thing. I do agree with Kevin Martin that something should be figured out for the Dutch Ashkenazi who have surnames in the Geni tree but never actually had those surnames as they weren't adopted until around 1811. I'm thinking their profiles need to be changed to a purely patronymic style if they never had a surname but the best practice may be to put the name as written with the surname under the display name. That way we are able to get the names to as close as they truly were while still saving surname connections they have to their descendants. I should mention that the few Dutch Ashkenazim who did use surnames pre-1811 should be written as such since they actually used the surname, although Levi or Cohen distinctions might be something for a different field. The whole Levi/Cohen distinction talk could be something to have with the larger Jewish Genealogy community as that is fairly consistent throughout the different Jewish cultures.

l looked for ever for the family of Gracia de Crasto, then by chance l found the burial record of a certain Isaac Baruch Bueno and lo and behold it gave his wifes name ...you guessed it.

Elsje Vos, maybe there is something being lost in translation but I don't understand what you find to be "impossible-to-work-with" about the standards I am suggesting. The only thing I think I understand that you are saying is that you believe the patronymics should be placed in the first name field, including the father's and grandfather's name?

I would disagree from a search engine standpoint as including the patronymics in the first name field will make it harder to find profiles, especially if someone were to use Geni's advanced search system. If we are to include patronymics I believe they should be placed in the middle name field, something which was adopted by other trees on Geni which deal with cultures with patronymics - https://wiki.geni.com/index.php/Patronymics. You are correct that Geni has a unique naming code and I believe that is something that puts Geni above the rest and exactly why I think these standards will optimize the tree.

I also believe the statement " Church-rules are subordinate" underplays the importance of the Portuguese Jewish Community of Amsterdam in the lives of its community members, especially considering that these records would best represent how these people actually referred to themselves on a daily basis. I believe this follows the 2nd rule set by the Coalition for Standardization of Geni Naming Conventions - "Try to get the Default name as close to the original name as possible, taking into account the original language/ dialect and time period." https://www.geni.com/projects/Coalition-for-the-Standardization-of-...