ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 2615 http://www.s-gabriel.org/2615 ************************************ 14 Dec 2002 From: Josh Mittleman Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You asked whether is an appropriate name for a 13th-15th century Italian woman. This letter is a brief answer to your question. We haven't found much evidence that was used in Italy in our period. We found a reference to a slave in Genoa in 1392 named ; but we're not sure that this spelling was actually used in the original document [1]. The forms and were definitely much more common: We've found these in 15th century Florence and 14th century Venice [2, 3, 4]. The surname isn't quite correct. The prefix is a contraction of "from the", and was most often used in Italian surnames that identified a person by some landmark near her home. Typical examples from 15th century records are , . In some cases, the same word was compounded with a given name, as in [5], but we have never seen it compounded with a place name. If you want your surname to mean "from [a place called] Alba", then the correct form is , which is a very typical Italian surname. There were several places called throughout Italy; the most important being a city in Piedmont [6, 7]. We have never seen the word "dawn" used in an Italian surname. We hope this brief letter has been useful. Please write us again if you have any questions. I was assisted in researching and writing this letter by Maridonna Benvenuti, Ursula Georges, Talan Gwynek, Laurensa de Chambord, Julie Stampnitzky, and Aryanhwy merch Catmael For the Academy, Arval Benicoeur 14 Dec 2002 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - References [1] Epstein, Stephen A., _Speaking of Slavery: Color, Ethnicity, and Human Bondage in Italy_, Cornell University, 2001, pp.172. [2] Arval Benicoeur, "Feminine Given Names from the Online Catasto of Florence of 1427" (WWW: J. Mittleman, 1998). http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/arval/catasto [3] McKee, Sally, _Wills from Late Medieval Venetian Crete 1312-1420_, 3 vols. (Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, 1998, ISBN 0884022455). [4] Arval Benicoeur and Talan Gwynek, "Fourteenth Century Venetian Personal Names" (WWW: J. Mittleman, 1999). http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/arval/venice14 [5] 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 See particularly the list of family names that appear in their database, a copy of which is at http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/ferrante/catasto/family_names.html [6] De Felice, Emidio, _Dizionario dei cognomi italiani_ (Arnoldo Mondadori Editore, 1978), s.n. Alba. [7] Maridonna Benvenuti, "Mercator's Place Names of Italy in 1554" (WWW: Academy of Saint Gabriel, 2001). http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/maridonna/mercator/