From: ce11son@yahoo.ca   
      
   On Sun, 23 Aug 2020 16:09:17 +0200, Athel Cornish-Bowden   
    wrote:   
      
   >On 2020-08-22 15:24:54 +0000, J. P. Gilliver (John) said:   
   >   
   >> On Sat, 22 Aug 2020 at 10:57:25, Jenny M Benson    
   wrote:   
   >>> On 22/08/2020 08:56, John Armstrong wrote:   
   >>>> It happened once while I was at a Scottish boarding school in the 60s.   
   >>>> Major, minor, and the youngest was "terts", short for "tertius", Latin   
   >>>> for "third".   
   >>>>   
   >> Odd, as maior and minor don't mean first and second, but bigger and   
   >> smaller (which usually mapped OK, as the older boy usually _was_   
   >> bigger), and why I had a vague feeling minimus (smallest) might have   
   >> been used when there was a third.   
   >>>   
   >>> An uncle-by-marriage of my mother's had a brother whose forenames were   
   >>> John Middleton Tertius and he was known generally as Tertius.  Their   
   >>> father's forenames were John Middleton as I presume their grandfather's   
   >>> were also.   
   >>>   
   >> Was he the third after a father and grandfather, or the third to the   
   >> same parents? (I have one ancestor* called Thirzen, who was the   
   >> thirteenth [surviving - fourteenth altogether I think] child, and I   
   >> like to think the parents were just too tired to think of another name   
   >> for her.   
   >> *not direct ascendant, a sibling of one [so a child of one]; is that   
   >> still an ancestor?)   
   >   
   >A pair of my great[5] grandparents had 17 children, of whom the   
   >youngest son was called Henry Septimus and the youngest daughter was   
   >called Louise Decima. I don't know how they knew that there wouldn't be   
   >any more.   
   >   
   If that was the 7th son and the 10th daughter then the numbers would   
   still match. I think I've seen one family in a census so far where   
   nearly all the children were numerically named; otherwise it seems to   
   be just the odd one or only the later children.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)