Guglielmo Babelli (orphan)

[Amansolillo]

I am seeking assistance in determining the parentage of Guglielmo Babelli, an orphan. Guglielmo was born on 15 September 1905 in Rome at a maternity ward for unwed women. His birth record (https://antenati.cultura.gov.it/ark:/12 ... 97/wEJmgK7) does not list either parent. Shortly after his birth, Guglielmo was adopted by the Di Muccio family of Vairano Patenora, where he was raised. He married Maddalena Apici on 15 May 1930 and had three children: Filomena, Gaetano, and Anna. Guglielmo died in Vairano Patenora in 1939. Several years ago, his son Gaetano took both Ancestry and 23andme DNA tests. Both tests suggest Guglielmo's family to have been from Scilla, as the majority of non-Vairano Patenora matches are mainly from Scilla or other comuni nearby in Reggio Calabria. In the past few years, I have made a family tree of these Scilla DNA matches with the hope that by determining how they are related to one another and using the cM and cousin degree prediction, I can zero in on potential families and possibly determine Guglielmo's parents.

So far, I have three potential leads:

1.) Gaetano's closest Scilla match on Ancestry (51 cM) and his second closest match on 23andme (42 cM) are 4th cousins 1x removed with each other and have common descent from Pasquale Zagari and Antonia Baviera (b. 1760s) of Scilla. I am extremely confident that Guglielmo is descended from Pasquale and Antonia (or least their parents) for two reasons. First, the 23andme match's great-grandfather (Guglielmo Zagari, b. 1874) is the only great-grandparent of the match from Scilla, which means that Guglielmo is related to this match's great-grandfather. Second, only one great-great-grandmother (Rachele Zagari, b. 1794) of the Ancestry match is from Scilla, meaning that Guglielmo is related to this match's great-great-grandmother. Guglielmo Zagari is the great-grandson of Pasquale Zagari and Antonia Baviera, and Rachele Zagari is their daughter. It is worth noting, I did at one point wonder if Guglielmo Zagari could have been the father of Guglielmo Babelli on account of them sharing the same name, but dismissed this as Gaetano and the 23andme match do not share enough cM for this close of a relation, plus I am not sure if Guglielmo Babelli's mother named him Guglielmo, or if the clerk in Rome did.

2.) Gaetano has a match on Ancestry (36 cM) who is Maltese. This match has one great-great-grandfather, Pietro Cardona, who I am confident is from Scilla. This lead isn't as airtight, as Pietro Cardona is listed on this match's own family tree, but without a birthdate, birth location, or parents listed. However, Gaetano and this match share several mutual DNA matches with a common descent from Tommaso Cardona and Tommasina Bova (b. 1810s), and Tommaso and Tommasina had a son Pietro Cardona born in 1849, so I am considering the two Pietro Cardonas to be the same. If this is the case, with Pietro Cardona being this match's sole ancestor from Scilla, I suspect Tommaso Cardona and Tommasina Bova (or their parents) to be Guglielmo's ancestors.

3.) This last lead is purely speculative. Gaetano's closest match on 23andme (51 cM) is half-Italian. From what I could find out through census records is that this match's grandparents came from Crotone, which is near Scilla. However, Gaetano has no DNA matches from Crotone, nor was I able to find any connection between this match's grandparents and Scilla. However, for a period of at least 10 years, an individual named Pasquale Igneri (b. 1875) boarded with the family of this match's grandmother (b. 1868). Pasquale Igneri was from Catona, and his grandfather Diego Igneri (b. 1808) was from Scilla. What makes this match interesting is that Gaetano and this match share mutual DNA matches with several descendants of Diego Igneri and his wife Anna Delfino, despite this match not being descended from the Igneri family. The only way this would make sense would be if this match's grandmother had a child with Pasquale Igneri and that this match was his descendant, but in communicating with this match, the match indicated that they had no knowledge of that.

At this point, I consider Pasquale Zagari and Antonia Baviera, Tommaso Cardona and Tommasina Bova, and Diego Igneri and Anna Delfino (or at least their parents to account for generational differences) to be viable ancestors for Guglielmo. One thing to note is that the Zagari family was of high social status, so I believe that perhaps one of Guglielmo's parents could have been descended from the Zagari family, and the other parent was descended from the Cardona and Igneri families. The working theory of Gaetano and his family is that Guglielmo's mother came from a wealthy background, as it must have been uncommon for a peasant woman from Scilla to go to Rome to give birth, as she most likely would not be able to afford it. If this is the case, it could be that Guglielmo's mother was sent to Rome by her parents to avoid the social shame of an unmarried pregnancy (especially if it was with someone of considerably lower social status or a case of sexual assault).

I understand that it is extremely difficult to determine the parentage of foundlings, especially that long ago during a time when records were not as detailed. I am hoping that someone might have advice on next steps I might take.

[Amansolillo]

It has been a couple of years since this initial post and I would like to update it in the hopes of anybody being able to provide some help, advice, or insight:

Previously, my theory was that Pasquale Zagari and Antonia Baviera, Tommaso Cardona and Tommasina Bova, and Diego Igneri and Anna Delfino were Guglielmo’s ancestors. However, two of my biggest roadblocks were connecting them and also establishing a connection to Rome. I had previously theorized that Guglielmo’s mother may have been sent to Rome to give birth in private so as to not tarnish the reputation of her family or the family of Guglielmo’s father. However, Rome is too far away from Reggio Calabria and there are other large cities before Rome for her to be sent to give birth privately for that to make sense. Rather, I began to consider the possibility of Guglielmo’s mother being in Rome at the time.

In investigating the descendants of Pasquale Zagari and Antonia Baviera and comparing DNA matches, I began to theorize that Pasquale and Antonia’s son Giovanni and his wife Vittoria Floccari could be Guglielmo’s ancestors. This could fit, as in lead #2 in my previous post, I mentioned a Maltese match whose great-great-grandfather, Pietro Cardona, came from Scilla. Where previously I considered Pietro’s parents, Tommaso Cardona and Tommasina Bova to be Guglielmo’s ancestors, that would have placed the Maltese DNA match far closer to Gaetano than the cM listed would suggest. However, in doing some more research, I found Tommaso Cardona’s maternal grandmother, Grazia Floccari, and Vittoria Floccari’s father Antonio, were siblings (their parents are Antonio Floccari and Francesca Velardi). If Giovanni Zagari and Vittoria Floccari were Guglielmo’s ancestors, then Gaetano would be related to the Maltese DNA match through the Floccari side, lending some credence to that possibility.

I went on FamilySearch to look up individuals from Scilla who died in Rome, just to see what would come up. I came across Francesco Zagari (1879-1936), who was born in Reggio di Calabria to Raffaele Zagari and Vittoria Caracciolo and died in Rome. According to his death certificate, he was a lawyer, and in Reggio di Calabria in 1912, married Rosita Federico, who was from the same city. Francesco is the grandson of Giovanni Zagari and Vittoria Floccari. While I cannot definitively place Francesco Zagari in Rome in 1905, he does emerge as a major candidate for being Guglielmo’s father due to his presence in Rome, descent from the Zagari and Floccari families, and one additional connection through his mother’s family:

Vittoria Caracciolo, mother of Francesco Zagari, was a foundling born in 1846 in Catona and was originally given the last name Fiorello. She married Raffaele Zagari in 1869 in Catona and in that same year, was recognized as the daughter of Giovanni Caracciolo. Vittoria later took the Caracciolo last name and died in 1889 in Reggio di Calabria. Vittoria’s death record indicates her mother was Francesca Delfino, listed as being deceased at the time. In a separate thread on this forum investigating the identity of this Francesca Delfino, four different Francesca Delfinos born from 1816-1830 in Catona were found. One of these Francesca Delfinos was born in 1818 to Francesco Delfino and Catarina Comis. This is important because in lead #3 in my previous post, I speculated Guglielmo was descended from Diego Igneri and Anna Delfino. Similar to my issue with lead #2 as I mentioned above, that would make his DNA matches with Diego and Anna’s descendants closer than the cM listed suggests. However, Anna Delfino is also a daughter of Francesco Delfino and Catarina Comis, making her the sister of that Francesca Delfino. If that Francesca Delfino is the mother of Vittoria Caracciolo, that would establish a connection between Gaetano and the Igneri family that would satisfy the cM they share. It is worth noting that in investigating Gaetano’s DNA matches, I have essentially confirmed Francesco Delfino and Caterina Comis as being his ancestors at this point. There are two problems with this theory, however. The first is that I cannot definitively confirm any Francesca Delfino as being the correct one, and the second is that Francesca Delfino, daughter of Francesco Delfino and Catarina Comis, died after Vittoria in 1894, not before Vittoria’s death in 1889 as Vittoria’s death record indicates. If this Francesca Delfino is indeed the correct one, it may be that Vittoria never really knew her or had a relationship with her and Francesca was presumed to be deceased by the time Vittoria died (for comparison, Vittoria’s father Giovanni Caracciolo died in 1874), or because Vittoria died in Reggio di Calabria and presumably lived there, and Francesca lived in Catona, the record-taker may have presumed she was deceased without verifying it.

Currently, my working theory is that Raffaele Zagari and Vittoria Caracciolo are the grandparents to Guglielmo Babelli, and that their son Francesco is potentially his father. I have tried researching Francesco’s wife Rosita Federico in case she may be Guglielmo’s mother, but besides identifying her parents as Filippo Federico and Elisabetta Ranieri, and her respective grandfathers as Leone Federico and Giuseppe Ranieri, I am unable to find any further information. Another mystery that remains is that there is a small but notable number of DNA matches to Gaetano which come from Marsico Nuovo and Trivigno in Basilicata. The closest match shares 28 cM, which is rather distant, but suggests to me that an ancestor of Guglielmo’s must have been from either of those towns. I have not made any headway with this yet.

To summarize all of this, because I realize this is a long read:
-Guglielmo Babelli was an orphan born in Rome in 1905 to an unknown unwed mother
-Gaetano, Guglielmo's son, took Ancestry and 23andme DNA tests, which identified a strong connection to Scilla and Catona
-Some of Gaetano’s closest matches from Calabria are descended from Pasquale Zagari and Antonia Baviera (Scilla), Antonio Floccari and Francesca Velardi (Scilla), and Francesco Delfino and Catarina Comis (Catona). They are most likely Gaetano/Guglielmo’s ancestors
-Francesco Delfino and Catarina Comis have essentially been confirmed as being Gaetano/Guglielmo’s ancestors by comparing DNA matches
-Francesco Zagari was a lawyer in Rome who came from Reggio di Calabria and was the son of Raffaele Zagari of Scilla and Vittoria Caracciolo of Catona. His wife was Rosita Federico
-Raffaele Zagari is the son of Giovanni Zagari and Vittoria Floccari
-Vittoria Caracciolo was a foundling who was determined to be the daughter of Giovanni Caracciolo and Francesca Delfino
-A Francesca Delfino from Catona was the daughter of Francesco Delfino and Catarina Comis
-Marsico Nuovo and Trivigno appear in a number of Gaetano’s DNA matches