[Magdalen] Lubitz.

[Cantor03 at aol.com]

I have been curious about this name, so I did some checking.
 
Since Poland and Germany have been side by side and there has
been much flip-flop of boundaries between them through the centuries,
it's no surprise that there are German names that have been used by
families who are Polish for centuries, and vice versa.
 
This is probably the case with the wacko copilot of the recent plane  crash
in the French Alps.  His name has a Slavic ending "itz" which is  the
German/Polish equivalent of -icz, -ich, and -age.  These are all  Slavic
endings that roughly equate to "son of" (Who can forget blonde beauty
newscaster Jessica Savage?).
 
Despite the Slavic origin of the "itz" names, the "itz" did not  hinder the
career of the famous Admiral Doenitz before and during WW-2.
He was Commander in Chief of the German Navy.
 
Then there was the second German warship of the Bismarck Class,
the Tirpitz - "The Lonely Queen of the North" - also named after a
German Admiral who commanded the German Navy.
 
A lot of history is buried in our names.
 
 
David Strang.