Genealogy Chat

Thank you all once again. I never expected such a large response.

I will make a note of that website for old french occupations, I think I may need it once ancestry.fr has got more records!

Hi,

try this site for old french occupations -
vieuxmetiers.org

could be a tireur from the town Greve

I was in Baton Rouge a few years back, and by the levee near the Capitol there was an impoundment in the Mississippi (titled Albert's Mud Farm or somesuch) and the guy was just collecting and selling silt.

Yes, there are a few in Brittany as well, if I remember rightly .

Phew!!!! got there in the end hey - bit like a think tank these boards!!!!

Hi there, I had no idea this would provoke so many responses.

Rose that was him, Constant Gatellier. His father, Charles Francois I believe is linked to my lot.

At least I know that it wasn't due to my lack of attention in french classes at school that is responsible for my inability to translate!

Thank you all for your suggestions.

The thread I put on the French genealogy board has so far had 31 views and just 1 reply.

The poster who replied said:

"The definitions of the word 'grève' in the Littré dictionary include:

- Masonry term. Coarse sand used to make mortar.

- Name given to the sandbanks formed in the River Loire, which are shifted by the current sometimes to one side, sometimes to the other .

So the term could be equivalent to 'tireur de sable'."

She then drew my attention to their thread on old occupations, which includes the following entry:

"Tireur de sable
Personne extrayant le sable des rivières"

(sand digger: person who extracts sand from rivers - my translation)

illustrated by the same picture as the one I've already posted here.

I wonder if it should be Tireur de Grauves?

Mariages du département de la Marne en France, 1529 à 1907 Marne, France Marriages, 1529-1907
about Joseph, garcon de culture COLLIQUET
Name: Joseph, garcon de culture COLLIQUET
Gender: Male
Place of Origin: Fagnieres
Age: 21 ans
Father: Josepph, tireur de greve COLLIQUET
Mother: Pudentienne BAUCHET

Looking up the parent's marriage they were both from Grauves.

Rose

Janet,

Do you remember which database it was? There are 3 instances of that occupation on the "Mariages du département de la Marne en France, 1529 à 1907."

Constant Gatellier had that occupation for 2 marriages. Seeing as it is a transcription and there are no images to be viewed it could be mistranscribed.

Mariages du département de la Marne en France, 1529 à 1907 Marne, France Marriages, 1529-1907
about Anne Marie ALSFASSER
Name: Anne Marie ALSFASSER
Gender: Female
Place of Origin: Saint-Wendel, Prusse
Age: 27 ans
Father: Jacob, proprietaire ALSFASSER
Mother: Barbe FLACHE (defunte)
Spouse's Name: Constant, tireur de greve GATELLIER
Spouse's Place of Origin: Ay
Spouse's Age: 24 ans
Spouse's Father: Charles Francois GATELLIER (defunt)
Spouse's Mother: Ursule Celestine FIERFORT
Comments about Spouse: Petit-Fagnieres
Marriage Date: 24 janv. 1858 (24 Jan 1858)
Marriage Location: Fagnieres
Comments about Marriage: Petit-Fagnieres

Rose

Well done Gemma - I endeavoured to do the same thing but got shot down!

Its not a translation...there is no translation of the phrase that I can find. I am trying to come up with suggestions that might lead to the solution. Instead of being negative and telling people what it isn't i'm trying to think outside the box slightly to work out what might have been meant at the time. If it was a modern well known term u'd have got it. I give up!!!!

La nuit, tous les chats sont gris? Mort du rire.

Gemma, I don't know where you're getting these translations from...

A "grève perlée" is a go-slow (ie. not an all-out strike, just working very slowly).

A "grève surprise" means a "lightning strike" (ie. a strike called suddenly), nothing to do with lightning striking (as in a thunderstorm).

"Tireur" has various possible meanings, depending on the context.

grève perlée is... to slowly go? and also the strike need not be work related grève surprise can be lightning striking.

tireur de cartes can be a fortune teller, where as tireur on its own can be a shooter (marksman) or sorter (of given items) etc as you already said.

It may even be a phrase used at the time that cannot be split into its singular parts but is no longer used.

All perfectly true.

However, the word "grève" in French, as far as I know, only has two meanings:

1. a strike, as in stopping work in protest (nothing to do with air strikes)

2. a strip of sand along the sea shore or river bank.

The fact that a certain word in English has several meanings doesn't necessarily mean that it'll have all the same meanings in French, and vice versa.

The problem is not only the language barrier and the age but also the transcription and translation. Airstrike translated into french then translated back into english can come back to "dog fight". Taken out of context can be misinterpreted as fighting with animals not knowing that airstrike translated into french is the arial attack sometimes known as a dog fight (shooting between two planes in a battle).

Words can also be nothing like what they meant in the past. Untill recently gay meant happy, now it is usually used as homosexual.

Language isnt always technical, sometimes translating geordie, cockney or brummie can be hard enough, trying to find foreign words for local dialect must be difficult no matter what the continent.

My ancestor is recorded as a hair dresser, It didnt fit in with the fact I already knew at the time that he was a professor untill I researched and discovered he made hair pieces for the medical proffession and researched hair loss and its causes and treatments, not at all the school teacher I anticipated.

Things are not always as they seem. Sometimes a suggestion can trigger other already known facts to make more sense.

I may have found something - I've just tried googling the phrase "tireur de sable" ("sable" means sand), which should have occurred to me before, and found this picture:

http://tinyurl.com/57k6ov

The guy is clearly taking sand out of the river, so I would guess that a tireur de grève is likely to be the same thing, or similar.

I guess you'd call him a "sand digger", or maybe a dredger as Derek said (although I thought a dredger was a boat).

So far the thread I posted on the French genealogy board has been viewed 5 times, but nobody's answered, so the answer evidently isn't obvious.

Sorry, Gemma, but your friend's answer didn't make any sense at all, which is why I thought it was written by someone who didn't speak French.

I do apologise if I sounded rude, though, I just didn't want Janet to be misled.

The reason nobody's found a definite answer is probably because this is a very old, non-standard term.

I'm a translator, and it isn't in any of my technical or non-technical dictionaries, or other usual sources.

OK, I've posted a message on a French genealogy board. I'll let you know if there are any replies.

Actually Mary that was very rude especially as I took the time and effort to have emailed the question to a friend who has achived A level french, studied in France and is currently studying French history. It may not be relevent because of it being "an old-fashioned, unusual term" but if you know so much about it then i am dismayed why you youself havn't been able to reach a conclusion. I'm deeply upset that anyone could be so rude about me offering some help.

I hope you find your answer Janet. xx

Gemma, I don't mean to be rude, but it really isn't helpful to guess when you obviously don't speak French.

The French embassy almost certainly won't be able to help, because this is an old-fashioned, unusual term.
A French university department might, but a French genealogy board would probably be a better bet.