I have created a short hand way of referring to my ancestors. Instead of the overly long "my mother's father's mother's mother." I use the Ma and Pa system to shorten that to "mapamama."
Here is how that looks in a tree:
papapapa
papapa
papa
papamapa
papama
papamama
pa
pamapapa
pamapa
pamapama
pama
pamamapa
pamama
pamamama
me
mapapapa
mapapa
mapa
mapamapa
mapama
mapamama
ma
mamapapa
mamapa
mamapama
mama
mamamapa
mamama
mamamama
The number of a's minus two tells you how many greats to use. You can calculate the Ahnentafel number by starting with one and doubling for a "pa" and doubling and adding one for a "ma." So "pamapa" is 2, then 4+1 for 5, and finally 10.
I might steal this. Something fun about it--it's the way the Swedish language works. In Swedish, the components are far and mor. Thus, my four grandparents are my farfar, farmor, morfar, and mormor.
ReplyDeleteIt can be confusing for little kids, though. For example, my mother is Farmor Swanstrom to my daughter but she's Mormor Swanstrom to my sisters' kids ;)