Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 371

Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 371

This report is available at http://www.s-gabriel.org/371

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

Greetings,

You asked for information on 12th or 13th century Italian names.

I am currently studying a census of the central Italian city of Perugia in 1285. The edition I'm using includes an analysis of the 251 women's names recorded in the census, and I've just posted a short article which presents that information. You can find the article on the web at http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names/perugia/. (If you don't have web access, let us know and we'll send you a copy of the article.)

In this census, most people were known by a given name and a patronymic (a surname that indicates their fathers' names). So a typical woman's name of that period might be "Rosa Francisci" (meaning Rosa, daughter of Francisco) or "Clara Benvenuti" (Clara, daughter of Benvenuto).

You didn't indicate if you are interested in using your renaissance name for your earlier-period persona, but we wanted to let you know that most of it is appropriate for both time. This sample of names did not include "Maddelena" in that spelling, but it did include one instance of "Madolina", which is another spelling of the same name. "Bruno" was a common man's name of the period, so "Madolina Bruni" would be a fine choice.

We hope this has been helpful for you.

For the Academy of Saint Gabriel, Arval Benicoeur

Reference:

Alberto Grohmann, "L'Imposizione Diretta nei Comuni della'Italia Centrale nel XII Secolo: La Libra di Perugia del 1285" (Paris, Torino: Eole Francaise de Rome, 1986).