Fort Isberg

[Laurel Holgerson]

I am looking for information on Fort Isberg. I am told that our family picked the Isberg name from the name of the fort.
 
Thank you in advance.
 
Laurel Holgerson

[Anna-Carin Betzén]

Are you perhaps thinking of the prehistoric fort Ismantorp? Check out this map of the parishes of Öland; Ismantorp is located in Långlöt parish, which borders on Glömminge (where Nils Peter Eriksson (or Jonsson?) Isberg was born in 1817, according to sources mentioned in ).
 
Superficially, Ismantorp is made up of the Swedish words for ice, man, and thorp, but I don't know if this is an etymologically correct derivation. BTW, -torp place names weren't in vogue until centuries after the fort had fell into disuse.

[Laurel Holgerson]

That could be it!  At least it is in the right local.  Does Oland have mountains or does the area have mountains?  
 
And it is hard to know if Nils picked the Isberg name or his father picked it.  Were there other Isbergs in the area?  Siblings?   Without a birth certificate, i guess it is hard to know.
 
Thanks for the info.  I appreciate your input.
 
Laurel

[Anders Ryberg]

Öland is flat, very flat.

[Laurel Holgerson]

It seems odd that a last name would be ice mountain when the local geography is flat. What experience would Nils have that would encourage him to choose Isberg.  Perhaps it is his father's name.  It is just very curious.

[Anders Ryberg]

I have the impression that people often took a part of the name of a place, and then added a generic ending like -berg or -dal or -man. I am not sure he contemplated the deeper meaning of his name that much when he took the name, just like my great-great-grandfather certainly had no more thoughts concerning Ryberg than that it sounded good...

[Chris Bingefors]

See below for Isberg people in Isgärde, Glömminge. But Anders is right, when my father took our name in the 1940s he wanted to use the name of the village/farm, Bingstorp, but was recommended by the authority responsible to use the first part of the farm name and then add -fors (meaning stream, there was no stream around) because it was more in keeping with tradition. The actual farm names were mostly used as add-ons by members of parliament in those days. In Norway and Denmark the farm name is very common as a surname.
 
So I think they used Is- for the village/farm and then added a generic ending.

[Laurel Holgerson]

I understand.  So to carry on the discussion, I wonder why some made those decisions in the 1700's all the way through to the 1940's and probably still today.  Using son and dotter became more difficult as part of a last name in the larger ciities. And when people emigrated, I could see why they would choose a last name.  Did the government encourage the use of one last name for a family  or was it an arbitrary decision by the local parish or community?  And did the military encourage the use of a surname.
 
Regards, Laurel

[Chris Bingefors]

In 1901 a new name law was passed. The old patronymics were made into family names, changing the -daughter ones to -son. Everyone had to have a family name, the patronymics had not been considered such, much as in Iceland today. Before 1901 you could change into any family name except established noble family names. You only told the vicar that you wanted to be knows as x in the future. Family names before that were mostly used by soldiers (and then sometimes only for one generation), civil servants and tradesmen. My grandmother b 1882, when she started school in 1889, was told by her parish priest that Segerlund would be a suitable name, since Segerlund was her stepgrandfathers name. So, she was registered as Segerlund. Before that she did not even have a family name, only a christian name.

[Anna-Carin Betzén]

You might be interested in visiting the English section of this site, which contains a number of articles, including one on Swedish names. Also see  this thread.
 
(Meddelandet ändrat av acb den 08 augusti, 2008)

[Laurel Holgerson]

I now understand how arbitrary names can be.  You might say it is a moving target.
 
Thank you for all the information and references.  
 
Regards, Laurel Holgerson