GIO: as a name-prefix?
GIO: as a name-prefix?
The Mormon FHL has just begun to make available films of the very early (i.e. 1584 through 1651) tax-declarations of towns in Messina Province. In these, I have encountered for the first time the use of what appears to be an all uppercase prefix "GIO: " placed before some of the given names - eg. "GIO : Pietro". It does not seem to be an abbreviation for Govanni or the like, since these abbreviations also appear but are written quite differently. Confusingly, however, the names with this prefix are sorted among the "G" given-names in the indexes which, as usual for the time, organized in given-name sequence.
