Naming two children the same name whilst both alive.

[Kiltpin]

I don't know if this is allowed.

 

How could it be regulated? The Registrar is not to know how many children and what names they are. 

Regards 

Chas

[HughC]

It seems to have been fairly common in the 19th century -- and to some extent in the early 20th -- to call children by a middle name.  That was the case with three of my grandparents (and the fourth had no middle name anyway).  So at least in theory one could have half a dozen siblings all with the same first forename (perhaps given in honour of a grandparent) but each known by a different name.

I still find it odd, whatever the circumstances or the explanation.

[Rhododendron]

My Gt. Grandfather married twice, and had a son to his first wife and then another who was named the same to his second wife.  Both sons were living at the same time. 

[iolaus]

Was the eldest Elizabeth still at home and considered part of the family?

It may be that when he started the new family the 'old' family was ignored and either out working and pretty much cut off or put into a children's home

[Lisa in California]

I have a few “double” names in several branches, mostly occurring mid- to late-1800s, some of them are: 

John and John (first died young)
Charlotte and Charlotte (both lived), mother Charlotte
Sarah and Sarah (first died young and possible a third Sarah, also died young), mother named Sarah

The following didn’t give two children in the family the same name, but…
My most confusing branch, all living at the same time, same town, same surname:
Three generations of James.
2nd generation, three sons (James, William and F. E. William) married, the sister remained single
3rd generation, three (cousins) named James, two (cousins) named William, two (cousins) named Emily
James was handed down since at least c1741
     Now I understand why the third generation James strictly used his middle name! When I started researching the family I had no idea that his first name was James.

I don’t think it is in my tree, I believe I was helping someone else, when I found three sons with the same first name, all three survived childhood.

Perhaps this was mentioned already by another poster, but (years ago I read that) due to high mortality among infants and children it wasn’t too unusual to use the same name more than once, in order to increase the odds of the name being carried down.

[Jackiemh]

In my tree I have John ye elder and John ye younger born to the same parents (16th century) - the father was Thomas. Luckily documented as such in parish records.
Jackie

[BristolClark]

Thank you to everyone for the responses. You've cetainly shown me that it isn't as rare an occurence as I had thought. Just seems odd to my "modern eyes" to see two children with the same name.

[Maiden Stone]

Another thing is using variants of a name in different languages e.g. John/Sean/Ian/Owen.

[wilcoxon]

My ancestor Thomas Wilcoxon was baptised in 1824, the illegitimate son of Thomas Wilcoxon.
His  father TW went on to have another illegitimate son before marrying another woman,
 In 1836 he  named his first legitimate son Thomas Wilcoxon. 
Both sons who lived about 15 miles from each other  named one of their sons Thomas.
🙄