Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 598

Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 598

This report is available at http://www.s-gabriel.org/598

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 information on the origin of the surname "Matera". Here is what we have found.

It is very hard to trace a modern surname to its ultimate roots without considerable research. Names can derive from a multitude of sources and can undergo strange spelling changes over the centuries. We do not have any good references on modern Spanish surnames, so we haven't been able to find a good answer to your question. We did find some similar names and we have some theories on the origin of your surname.

We found a few examples of a feminine given name "Mater", recorded in Leon in the 10th and 11th centuries [1]. It is probably derived directly from the Latin word "mater" (mother). A second source records "Matre" as a byname at the same time [2]. In Spanish, the Latin "mater" became the modern "madre", not "matera", which leaves this derivation of your surname open to question.

There was a Roman family called "Materius". It was the root of a French place name recorded in 977 as "Maidera" [3] and possibly of the Spanish byname "Materia". But the internal 't' in Latin words usually became a 'd' in modern Spanish and Catalan derivatives, so we would expect the modern form of these names to be "Madera" rather than "Matera".

The 11th century given name "Maternus" or "Matermus" is a remote possibility. It is recorded in the patronymic "Materniz" [4].

It is also possible that the name derives from a place name, either in Catalonia or elsewhere. For example, there is a city called "Matera" in Italy. It is the capital of the region of Basilicata in Lucania.

I hope this letter has been useful. I was assisted in researching and writing this letter by Talan Gwynek.

For the Academy,

Arval Benicoeur


References

[1] Pascual Martinez Sopena, editor, Antroponimia y Sociedad (Universidade de

Santiago de Compostela and Universidad de Valladolid, 1995)

[2] Solin & Salomies [full citation, please]

[3] Morlet, Marie-Therese, Les Noms de Personne sur le Territoire de

l'Ancienne Gaule du VIe au XIIe Siecle, v.III (Paris: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1972)

[4] R. P. Gonzalo Diez Melcon, Appellidos Castellano-Leoneses (Granada:

Universidad de Granada, 1957).