Date: Sat, 25 Feb 1995 14:25:52 -0500

From: "Peter L. Patrick" PPATRICK[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]GUVAX.BITNET

Subject: "little" and "jr"



The most famous "little" I know of is Little John, who was famously

not little at all, but there it DID have to do with size (punning by

antonym), I guess-- or was there a Big John in the Merry Men?

Someone asked if "Jr." drops off a name after the death of the

"Sr." (which in turn doesn;'t exist before the birth of the "Jr.").

But I don't think so, necessarily: it's equivalent to (referentially,

though certainly not stylistically!) "II" or "the 2nd". My mother's

paternal grandfather was Edwin King Lumpkin; her dad was Edwin King

Jr. (or I suppose "the 2nd" but nobody ever seems to have called him

that); my Uncle Ed is thus "the 3rd" (but again...); and his son is

Edwin King Lumpkin the 4th. Being easy-going fellows none of them ever

wanted to be called anything but "Ed"-- or "King", which is what my

cousin is called to distinguish him from Ed, his dad, instead of

Little Ed. My older brother is a Jr. too but it looks like he's on his

way to having a third daughter, so it may stop there-- unless there's

an accident, no Kenneth Gilbert Patrick III is on-line...

--peter