Origins of the name Elg

 

”Elg” is the Swedish name (old spelling) of the animal Americans know as a ”moose” (not an elk!).While by no means a common name, ”Elg” is not unique to our family.

 Two hundred years ago, family names were mainly used by members of the nobility. Ordinary people were known by their father´s first name, called a patronymic. If your first name was Karl, and your father was John, you were known as Karl Johnson but your children would by Karlsson, or Karlsdotter (-daughter)

In our family, the Elg name first appears in 1779 when Petter Jansson becomes a master blacksmith at Gravendal and adopts the name Elg as his ”trademark”. This is one of the few exceptions to the use of patronymics. A master blacksmith would be an independent contractor, hire his own assistants etc, and his sons would often follow in his footsteps, founding a dynasty of blacksmiths.

A second source of ”Elgs” was the army. In a small village, keeping track of ”Karl Svensson” was no problem, but in a larger group of soldiers, too many Karl Svensson led to confusion, and no one cared who your father was anyway. So the army assigned ”soldier names”, unique at least within your company. Names were chosen to be short and easy to berk across a parade ground or battle field, and often animal names were chosen to instill a sence of strength or courage. And no, these names were not assigned as a badge of distinction, they were only there to identify you.

In theory, these names should only be used in the army, but many retired soldiers retained the name and passed it own to his cildren. But in our case, I have found no military conntection, it is prely a ”blackamith name”.