Prior to that these phonemes were recorded with two or more letters such as ch , sh , sch etc. Sometimes even a surname would be translated into German, for example Wolf instead of Volk or Vovk. Due to different reasons at different times in our history our towns were also named differently. There was barely a town not recorded in the language of the majority - Slovenian. Also first names were registered differently at different times.
Older records contain mainly Latin names but later on German terminology prevailed.
Most of those whose first name was Janez were thus recorded as Joannes or Johann. People were seldom recorded in register by the name he or she was really known by. It is particularly awkward that the one and the same person gets to be recorded differently on different occasions such as birth, marriage and death by the same recording cl erk. A researcher should be familiar with all these different written records of first names which can be found in many reference books. In the Slovenian language we have Leksikon imen by Janez Keber.