Capital letters in Mc.. names

[Ferbian]

First off, didn't see this thread appropriate in the Cigar Lounge because its more of a question than a discussable matter, so Town Square it is.
Feel free to move it in case it was Cigar Lounge material.

So recently I've been doing a little bit of wondering, around the world we got quite a handfull of last names that has the "Mc" part, followed by something else which is also started with a capital letter, like for example, McIntyre, the NCIS character: McGee.
Hell we got McDonalds, all these names starting with Mc is followed by another capital letter to put the remaining part of the name or last name.

I live in Denmark, I don't run into this alot, so it's not common grammar teaching for me.
So I'm wondering, how come "Mc names" has twice the capital letter and not simply put, Mcgee, Mcdonalds, Mcintyre etc.?

 

[ABMorales787]

McItdontmatteritsonthebirthcertificate.

 

[The Doctor]

I think it just looks good and is a way of separating the two syllables.

 

[Барбоса]

'Mc' and 'Mac' mean 'son of' so the original McDonald was 'son of Donald.' Donald remains capitalised as it is the original family name. As surnames became standardised rather than recording whose son you were, Mc, Mac, Ma, O' etc. became capitalised as well.

McDonald is the same name as the Scandanavian version Donaldson.

It is merely a different use of the genitive case - 'son of' rather than 'someone's son.'

 

[Ferbian]

'Mc' and 'Mac' mean 'son of' so the original McDonald was 'son of Donald.' Donald remains capitalised as it is the original family name.

Therefore, McDonald is the same name as the Scandanavian version Donaldson.

It is merely a different use of the genitive case - 'son of' rather than 'someone's son.'

Oh yeah, I believe I heard that once too, must've completely wiped my memory of that fact to make room for.. something otherwise pointless, I don't know.
Cheers for clearing it up for me thou

 

[Барбоса]

Maybe for a wrestling forum I should have used the example of McDaniel and Danielson

 

[Tastycles]

I think it's Iceland where they still do that. Men are called Whatever Dadsnamesson and women are Whatever Dadsnamedottir, so a family of a couple, a son and a daughter would all have different surnames.

 

[Барбоса]

Yeah, Iceland still uses patronymics. I read somewhere that their telephone is interesting. Alphabetised by forename rather than surname...

 

[ABMorales787]

Mc Hammer.

 

[Remix]

Yep Scotland invented rap. it's not McDonald, It's MC Donald.

but seriously it means son of.

 

[Luther_Hull]

"of" means "or" in Dutch, so Jan Vennergoor of Hesselink's name actually means Jan Vennegoor or Hesselink, think of it as a double-barreled name, but Dutch.

Not the question you were asking, but still, an important nugget of name-related information.