On 2006-10-11, Theerasak Photha <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On 10/10/06, Piet van Oostrum <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> >>>>> Roel Schroeven <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (RS) wrote: >> >> >RS> It's the same here in Belgium. Except that our Van is with a capital V >> >in >> >RS> most cases; if it's a lower v it either indicates nobility or a Dutch >> >name. >> >> >RS> I don't see it as a problem. I prefer having Van Straeten and Van >> >Stralen >> >RS> next to each other than having them mixed up with names without Van like >> >RS> this: >> >RS> Straeten, Van >> >RS> Straetmans >> >RS> Stralen, Van >> >> In Holland it is sorted without the 'van' 'de' etc. > > Which was my original point in mentioning similar Portuguese names. :)
But in Belgium (That includes the flemisch region) names are sorted with the 'van' 'de' etc. De reason is rather simple. If you hear someone's name as "Van den Hautte", you have no idea how it is spelled Van Den Haute Vandenhaute Vanden Haute These are all possible. Now I think you can hardly sort "Vandenhaute" next to "haute" because then you would need to know al kind of prefixes that may be also written seperately. So by putting all these names together it makes for easier searching in case you have doubts on how the name is actually written. > BTW, do Dutch/Flemish family names now follow the trend of dropping > declension, as seen in both languages (dialects?) in general: e.g., > 'de' instead of 'der'? Yes but not in names (at least in Flemish families) -- Antoon Pardon -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
