I had tried visiting the World Names Profiler a couple weeks ago, but the interactive map wasn't working for me. Thanks to a tip from Gerard at the Presurfer, I returned today and met with complete success.
When you visit the site and type in your family name, it generates a world map showing the relative frequency of that name per million people, created from a database of 5 million unique names and 300 million names located worldwide. You can zoom each country to a state, regional, or county-equivalent level.
I've embedded the map of my maternal Distad grandparent above, and the "hot spot" is correct down to the correct fjord in Norway. Searching a paternal grandparent allowed me to find the likely point source in Germany, which I had previously not known.
Addendum: World Names Profiler has undergone linkrot since 2008.
Quite accurate. I lived in a remote region in Quebec Canada and found it pretty weird that I know someone that has for each top names displayed for my region.
ReplyDeleteHello! I see that the names profile has linkrot but is there another way to find out more about this? My Grandfather was a Distad- I got their important papers and would like to dig as deep as I can with this.
ReplyDeleteGreetings, cousin Hanah -
DeleteI wrote another post about my branch of the Distads last year -
https://tywkiwdbi.blogspot.com/2022/09/deciphering-old-photo-of-norway.html
- but what I would suggest you do is to explore the Ancestry.com website:
https://www.ancestry.com/
I went there back before Christmas when they had a special deal allowing anyone to explore the site free of charge for 30 days (I don't know if that offer continues or has been renewed). By typing in my grandparents names, I was able to trace my Distad ancestors back about ten generations to the 1600s, including where they lived and who their spouses were etc.
It's an amazing resource. You don't have to do much other than click, and the website builds the tree for you.