ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 3052
http://www.s-gabriel.org/3052
************************************

17 Jun 2006
From: Ursula Whitcher 

Greetings from the Academy of S. Gabriel!

You wanted to know if an Italian woman living in the 15th or 16th
century would have taken her husband's surname upon marriage or
retained her family name.

Our best data from this time period is from Florence and surrounding
cities in Tuscany, though we do have some from other regions.  We found
a wide variety of naming practices.  A woman might use her father's
surname, her husband's surname, or both simultaneously.  She might also
be identified by her husband's full name, or by just his given name.
One important influence on surname was the relative importance of the
husband's and wife's families.  In some cases, where the wife's family
was more well-known than the husband's, _he_ would take her name upon
marriage. [1,2,3,6]

Here are some specific examples of bynames incorporating a husband's name.

Many of our fifteenth-century examples of women identified by their
husbands' names explicitly describe each woman as a wife or widow.  We
found the following examples in Florentine records from between 1417 and
1436: [4]

   Domenica moglie di Neri        Domenica wife of Neri
   Lorenza vedova di Bartolomeo   Lorenza widow of Bartolomeo

We also found examples from 15th C Palermo of married women identified
by the husband's given name without his surname or by the husband's
full name: [5]

   donna Tummia di Noratu vidua   Lady Tummia of Noratu, widow
   Ysmiralda di Armannu vidua     Ysmiralda of Armannu, widow
   Bella di Julianu vidua         Bella of Julianu, widow
   Marina vidua di Gerjoanni      Marina widow of Gerjoanni
   Maria di Stefanu vidua         Maria of Stefanu, widow
   Luchia mugleri di              Luchia wife of
      Bartholomeu Mulinu             Bartholomeu Mulinu

In fifteenth-century letters from Florence, we found women identified by
their husbands' given names, by their husbands' full names, and by just
a surname: [7,8]

      Mona Lucrezia di Piero      Mona Lucrezia of Piero
      Margherita di Pippo Manetti Margherita of Pippo Manetti
      Lucrezia de' Medici

A dance manual from Milan printed in 1602 and 1604 contains the names of
several hundred noble and upper class women.  Many of the women are
identified by a pair of surnames, joined by <e> 'and' or <e\> 'is, that
is'.  (Here we've used the slash \ to represent a grave accent over the
letter 'e'.)  One of these surnames may be a husband's name.  Here are
some examples of women with the surname <Coira>.  All of these women are
identified by the title <La signora>. [9]

   La signora Clara Buscha e Coira
   La Signora Veronica Tavola, e\ Coira
   La signora Caterina Coira, e\ Roma
   La signora Zanobia Coira, e\ Dardanona
   La signora Innocenza Rainola, e\ Coira
   La signora Anna Coira, e\ Raverta
   La signora Leonora Coira, e\ Landriana

We hope that this letter has been useful to you and that you won't
hesitate to write to us again if any part was unclear or if you have
further questions.  Research and commentary on this letter was
provided by Juliana de Luna, Maridonna Benvenuti, Arval Benicoeur,
Gunnvor Silfraharr, Talan Gwynek, and Sara Marino.

For the Academy,
-Aryanhwy merch Catmael and Ursula Georges
17 June 2006

--
References:

[1] Klapisch-Zuber, Christiane, _Women, Family and Ritual in
Renaissance Italy_, translated by Lydia G. Cochrane (Chicago: The
University of Chicago Press, 1985), p. 307.

[2] Spreti, Vittorio, _Enciclopedia storico-nobiliare italiana_
(Milano, 1928-36).

[3] "The Lives of Renaissance Women" (WWW: British Columbia Teachers'
Federation, 1996)
http://www.bctf.bc.ca/lessonaids/online/LA9245.html
notes of Artemisia Gentileschi 1593-1652 that "she was the daughter and
student of Orazio Gentileschi (1563-1639) whose name she kept rather
than taking that of her husband..."

[4] _The Years of the Cupola_. Digital archive of the sources of the
Opera di Santa Maria del Fiore, 1417-1436, Margaret Haines, ed.,
Florence, Opera di Santa Maria del Fiore, copyright 2004).
http://www.operaduomo.firenze.it/cupola/ENG/IN/IN2list0.HTM (accessed
24Apr05).

[5] Di Pasquale, Armando, _Palermo nel 1480. La popolazione del
quartiere della Kalsa_, Palermo, 1975.

[6] Fucilla, Joseph G., _Our Italian Surnames_ (Evanston, IL: Chandlers'
Inc., 1949), p. 19.

[7] Lucrezia Tornabuoni _Lettere_, a cura di Patrizia Salvadori,
Firenze, Leo S. Olschki, Editore, MCMXCIII.

[8] Gregory, Heather, trans. _Selected Letters of Alessandra Strozzi'_,
Bilingual edition, Univ. of CA Press, Berkeley, 1997.

[9] "Cesare Negri's Le Gratie d'Amore / Nuove Inventioni Di Balli
(1602/1604)" (WWW: Gregory Blount of Isenfir).
http://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/negri/
http://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/negri/transcription/0006.clean.html