About the work

A closer look.

Send me one name. Your surname, a family name changed at a border, a name you were given and never asked about. I bring back where it actually came from: the place or word under it, the trail it left, what it was before it was this, what it survived. You get a written brief, about 500 words, with the specific findings and the named sources so you can check them yourself. Where the record is thin I say so and name it as my read. I will not invent a lineage and I will not pad a page.