Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 360

Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 360

This report is available at http://www.s-gabriel.org/360

Some of the Academy's early reports contain errors that we haven't yet corrected. Please use it with caution.

Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel!

You asked for our opinion of "Cosimo Niccolai diCellini" as a 16th century Italian name. We don't have great resources for 16th century Italian names, but we think we have enough material to evaluate your name. Here's what we found.

"Cosimo" is almost certainly correct for your period. We don't have the sources to date it later than 1427 [1], but we are confident that it continued in use to the end of the Society's period.

You didn't tell us whether you intend "Niccolai" to be a second given name or a first surname. We will discuss both possibilities.

"Niccolai" is a Tuscan surname, a patronymic derived from the very common given name "Niccolo" [2]. In Italian, a patronymic surname (i.e. a surname which derived from the given name of your father or one of his ancestors) is sometimes formed directly from a given name, without modification (e.g. Cosimo Niccolo), and sometimes from the possessive form of the given name (e.g. Cosimo Niccoli, literally "Niccolo's Cosimo"). Either form may or may not be set off by the preposition "de" or "di". We could not find clear evidence that "Niccolai" was used as a given name. Therefore, if you intend to use it as a second given name, we suggest that you use "Niccolo" instead, since it is the most common form in late period Italian. If you intend to use it as a patronymic surname, then "Niccolai" is definitely correct.

It is worth noting at this point that double given names were reasonably common in 16th century Italian, but much less so than they are today. In general, double given names (or middle names) were introduced late in our period and slowly became more common. They are almost universal today in most European languages, but in period they were the exception rather than the rule. For your persona, a double given name is entirely appropriate; but you should be aware that it was still most common for a man to have only one given name.

"Cellini" is another patronymic surname, derived from "Cello", which is itself a nickname for several other given names (Baroncello, Pacello, Simoncello, etc.). "Di" is frequently found as a preposition in a patronymic surname (e.g. di Blasi, di Liberti, di Mattei) [2]. Therefore, we have no hesitation is saying that "di Cellini" is correct for your period. However, we do recommend spelling the name as two words, as I've written it here.

In summary, the name you have chosen is basically correct. We suggest that you choose one of these versions, slightly modified to match our research:

I hope we have answered your questions. If you have any further questions, we'll be happy to try to help.

For the Academy of Saint Gabriel,

Arval Benicoeur


References

[1] Ferrante la Volpe, "Italian Names from Florence, 1427",

http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/ferrante/catasto

[2] Emidio De Felice, Dizionario dei Cognomi Italiani (Milano: Arnoldo Mondadori Editore, 1978)