Pelan Name Study

Date: 7 Jul 2023 [unknown]
Surnames/tags: Pelan Pelin Palan

About the Project

The Pelan Name Study project serves as a collaborative platform to collect information on the Pelan name. The hope is that other researchers like you will join the study to help make it a valuable reference point for other genealogists who are researching or have an interest in the Pelan name.

As a One Name Study, this project is not limited to persons who are related biologically. Individual studies can be used to branch out the research into specific methods and areas of interest, see below. These studies may also include a number of family branches which have no immediate link with each other. Some researchers may even be motivated to go beyond the profile identification and research stage to compile fully sourced, single-family histories of some of the families they discover through this name study project.

Also see the related surnames and surname variants.

How to Join

To join the Pelan Name Study, first start out by browsing our current research pages to see if there is a specific study ongoing that fits your interests. If so, feel free to add your name to the Membership list below, post an introduction comment on the specific team page, and then dive right in!

If a research page does not yet exist for your particular area of interest, please contact the Name Study Coordinator: John Pelan for assistance.

Once you are ready to go, you can also show your project affiliation with the ONS Member Sticker:

Research Pages

I am preparing to transition trees and notes on the Pelan ONS study from my own personal website on the Pelan surname study but before I do, I am checking templates, categories etc. to ensure that work is correctly labelled and categorised.

Here are some of the current research pages included in the study:

Ulster Pelan

Pelan and accepted pedigree variants with Ulster origins (or at least significant Irish connections). My DNA study and research has established that it PELAN is a variant of PALING / PAYLING as found in Nottinghamshire, England today. The PELIN surname as found in Dublin since at least the 18th century is also a variant. I am preparing a paper to assist with updating the current Family Name publications.

You should add the Category for Pelan Name Study, Ulster to any profile that has proven connections back to the Irish province of Ulster (notably Lambeg, Lisburn and Belfast).

See Space:Ulster_Pelan.

Breton Pelan

The Pelan name in France seems to come from Brittany (Bretagne) and is likely to be a variant of PELLAN as they are typically found together. In the mid-2000s, there were quite a few entries for Pelan in the French telephone directory concentrated in Brittany.

• Etude du patronyme PELLAN by Jean-François Pellan
• Breton Association of Genealogy and History

Austro-Hungarian - Pelán / Pelan

Pelans can be found in a region which includes, but is not limited to, the Czech Republic, Solvakia, Slovenia and Austria. Indeed, the spread of the Pelan surname in Eastern Europe seems to cover much of what was the Austro-Hungarian empire, hence the name. This is not being used in any political sense but just a label for that geographical area.

The Dictionary of American Family Names has an entry for Pelan which gives two Czech definitions:

• a derivative of the Old Czech personal name Pelhřim.
• nickname from pela ‘cheerful’, ‘happy-go-lucky fellow’ .

Many surname etymologies are difficult to prove (and indeed there are two different ones presented here) but this entry does show (presumably) plausible derivations and which are notably independent of any French or Irish origins. Chance convergence has thus given rise to an identical surname.

A Mr. Petr Pelán has kindly contacted me. He suggests that that the Czech surname is found largely in Moravia and he also pointed out the Czech "Home Office" statistics, which says there are about one thousand people called Pelán and one hundred called Pelan.

If a dedicated study emerges for the Pelán surname, they will absorb the 'Pelan' variant for their region as Pelán is the proper form, as I understand it.

Membership

Related Surnames and Surname Variants

• Pelin
• Palan
• Pelling