Ia in surnames

[NickAndreola]

Does anyone know if the addition of IA to a surname indicates a complete separate family line or is there possibility of some previous connection? For examples; Niro to IAniro, Covelli to IAcovelli, Rossi to IArossi. I know in research from other parts of the world that family names like Williams and WilliamSON and Peders and PederSEN etc...often have common roots and sometimes actual connected family members used differing versions.

Does the IA mean anything? Niro=black Ianiro=?

[erudita74]

The "Ia" is at the beginning of the surnames. Dropping the "Ia" leaves you "pet names." So it's Ianiro to Niro, Iacovelli to Covelli, etc. These surnames all derived from the same branch, according to Professor Joseph G. Fucilla in his book Our Italian Surnames. The branch from which these surnames derived is The Giacop(p)o-Iacop(p)o Branch. There is a preview on the website googlebooks.com, starting with page 42. Link is below:

https://books.google.com/books?id=Qmg6D ... ch&f=false

For some reason, the link above takes you to page 43, so go back a page on the website to page 42.

Erudita

[PippoM]

Erudita,
said this way, it might seem that all such surnames have the same origin, but I don't believe that.
I'd rather say they "belong" to the same branch (a sort of classification of surnames).
Maybe we'd need to read more of that book.

[NickAndreola]

Thanks for that link!

Yes, the snippet allowed to be viewed may have confused more than enlightened me. I had thought that the Nero/Niro had existed first, then may have been altered to Ianiro (or Ianiro existed separately). Hopefully, this book is in the library and I can dig deeper--it also had some un-viewable sections on Albanian influences that I'm really interested in.

[erudita74]

https://www.italyheritage.com/genealogy ... ymology/i/

The following is in Italian:

https://archive.org/details/OrigineESto ... miItaliani

[NickAndreola]

That 2nd link especially is que bello! Thank you!

[erudita74]

Hi Nick
Glad I found the second link. It's a new one for me too! Hope you find something you need.
Erudita

[PippoM]

The same content is also available here:

http://www.ganino.com/cognomi_italiani

[NickAndreola]

Erudita, yes this has a lot of excellent information including some of the localities of origination for these surnames. Mine doesn't show up exactly as it is, but others in the 'family' like "Andreoli is widespread throughout the centronord, northern Campania and Calabria, Andreolo, almost disappeared, it would seem Venetian" and "Andriolo has a large Venetian stock, especially in the Vicenza area and in the Venetian area, a Pugliese stock between Bari, Brindisi and Lecce, and a Sicilian stock, in particular in Palermo and in Messina and Catania."----all other avenues of research! (such FUN!)

Pippo, that link allows for MUCH easier copy/paste into a translator functionality for non-Italian readers like me! Thank You!