three names on birth extracts

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thestark
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three names on birth extracts

Post by thestark »

On many of the Allegati records of my ancestors, in the Birth Extracts, I'm finding that newborns are given a string of names, usually separated by a short dash, like so:

Alberto - Giuseppe - Eugenio

or

Maria - Oliva - Catterina

The middle name in each string appears to be their official first name. In the margins of the Extracts or elsewhere in other documents, the second name in the list is used as the first (unless capital M with a superscript "a" is short for "Maria").

I thought that the first name in the list might be their Catholic "spiritual name" and the last name in the list is the middle name, but I'm not sure.

Is there any special meaning to such a string of names?
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johnnyonthespot
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Re: three names on birth extracts

Post by johnnyonthespot »

thestark wrote:... (unless capital M with a superscript "a" is short for "Maria")...

It is indeed.

Maria can often be found as a first name for both males and females. My impression (I may be way off base...) is that, when combined with a "second" name, Maria is more of an honorific - presumably to the Virgin Mary - and is rarely the name which the person uses in his/her daily life. This being especially true for males.

Yes, "Ma" or "M.a" are common abbreviations for Maria. See this page and scroll to the second page for tables showing many other common abbreviations of Italian names: http://books.google.com/books?id=i_qgMM ... ia&f=false
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maestra36
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Re: three names on birth extracts

Post by maestra36 »

I have found that when the name Maria is either a male or female first name, or a male or female middle name, it was often dropped in subsequent records.
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Sal
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Re: three names on birth extracts

Post by Sal »

In Trentino, where preprinted registers were not used, the church birth registers often wrote the child's names as Middlename - Firstname - Lastname. When written like this, the Firstname was often underlined. As to using Maria as a male or female name, I had a similar occurance. My middle name (after my gf) is Nicola, which can be male or female. Quite a bit of teasing as a teen. :)
Researching Iob (Job, Yob), Dalpiaz, Zanon in villages of Cunevo and Flavon (Trentino) and Romano in Spadafora (Sicily).
www.trentinoheritage.com
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liviomoreno
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Re: three names on birth extracts

Post by liviomoreno »

Nicola, in Italian, is only masculine. :wink:
The are other names ending in "a" that are only masculine: Andrea, Luca, Mattia...

Maria was added to male as second or third name.
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