ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 1399 http://www.s-gabriel.org/1399 ************************************ 21 Dec 1998 From: (Josh Mittleman) Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You asked about <Jodius Brunelleschi>, which you want to use as an early 14th or early 15th century Italian masculine name. Here is what we have found. Before I start, I'd like to clarify the service that the Academy offers. We try to help Societyfolk in choosing and using names that fit the historical cultures they are trying to re-create. Our research can sometimes be used to support submissions to the College of Arms, but that it not our goal and our results are often incompatible with the College's needs. If your main goal is to document a particular name, then we may not be able to help you. We could not find the name <Jodius> in any of our references. The <-us> ending implies that it is a Latin name, which could well have been used in formal records in your period; but in daily life an Italian merchant would certainly have used the Italian form of his name. The letter <J> is almost unknown in period Italian; names that begin with <J> in Latin usually begin with <Gi> in Italian. For example, Latin <Julius> produced Italian <Giulio>. The closest name we found to <Jodius> is <Giudo>, which we found in Florence in 1427 [1]. <Giudo> may be an Italian form of <Jude> or <Judah>. <Judah> was a common Jewish name, so this person may have been a Florentine Jew. If you can tell us where you found <Jodius>, we may be able to discover more information. <Brunelleschi> was the surname of a very famous 15th century Florentine artist, but it was also a common name, at least in Florence. We found 9 families using this surname in a census of Florence from 1427 [2]. In your period, most Tuscan men were known as their father's sons. Although family names were in use, they were generally not used in the same way as they are today. <Giulio> the son of <Piero> of the <Brunelleschi> family would have been called <Giulio di Piero Brunelleschi>. In many cases, he would simply have been called <Giulio di Piero> [3]. We hope this letter has been useful. Please write us again if any part of it has been unclear or if you have other questions. I was assisted in researching and writing this letter by Talan Gwynek, Zenobia Naphtali, and Aryanhwy merch Catmael. For the Academy, Arval Benicoeur 21 Dec 1998 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - References [1] Ferrante laVolpe, _Men's names from Florence, 1427_ (WWW: Self-published, 1996). http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/ferrante/catasto [2] Herlihy, David and Christiane Klapisch-Zuber, "Census and Property Survey of Florentine Domains in the Province of Tuscany, 1427-1480", Machine readable data file. Online Catasto of 1427 Version 1.1. Online Florentine Renaissance Resources: Brown University, Providence, R.I., 1996 http://swansong.stg.brown.edu/projects/catasto/overview.html [3] Borgia, L., et. al., eds., _Le Biccherne : tavole dipinte delle magistrature senesi (secoli XIII-XVIII)_ (Roma : Ministero per i beni culturali e ambientali, 1984), passim.