Family surname changes in Italy

[MarcuccioV]

I'm curious if anyone in their research has found a surname line that has changed at one point or another (I'm referring to changes within Italy and not "Americanizations" of Italian surnames).

Case in point: On an extensively researched family tree created by a former contributor here who has family members in common with me, one of our family surnames, Giorgi, was changed from Tessitori in the early 17th century. The patriarchs name was Giorgio Tessitori (son of Mario) who had 7 children. The first (Angelo, a son) kept the surname of Tessitori, but the next son (Paolo, and all his other 5 siblings), changed the surname to "Giorgi" (obviously based on the father's first name). For all I know, Giorgio himself made the change after his first son was born.

This is different than with foundlings found in the commune (these are generally named "Proietti" and I have at least one of these in my tree as well -- coincidentally, married to a Giorgi). It makes me wonder if this happened (prior to civil documentation) on any of my other family lines too.

Anyone else have a similar situation (foundlings excepted, of course)..?

[darkerhorse]

That's going back pretty far. I wonder if you're sure of the documents meaning.

Does the name Tessitori have a definitional meaning?

I've only noticed changes in the first name among my Italian ancestors.

As you may know, the French commonly used aliases (called "dit" names, perhaps for "ditto"?) which were continued by some French-Canadians.

[MarcuccioV]

That's going back pretty far. I wonder if you're sure of the documents meaning.

Does the name Tessitori have a definitional meaning?

The information is confirmed by notarial documents that are linked on the same site. "Tessitori" is plural of "Tessitore" meaning "Weaver".

Tessitori is rare, wheras Tessitore is found in predominantly in Campania, Lazio & Sicily. Where Mario or Giorgio were born is not documented on the tree, just that they wound up in our home commune...

[parkergambino]

I'm not sure if the definition of "foundling" extends to someone whose parents are unknown (or at least undocumented). I don't have anybody named "Proietti" in my extended ancestral families; in the pertinent Sicilian locales the name "Citta" was instead applied to people whose parents were unknown. Then once they married and had children, Citta became the legitimate surname to be perpetuated forward, not necessarily indicating any relationship whatsoever with others sharing the same surname.

Seems straightforward enough, if inconvenient. But in a few of my other posts
https://www.italiangenealogy.com/forum/ ... 37#p345237
https://www.italiangenealogy.com/forum/ ... 29#p345329
I struggle (and seek counsel) to understand the naming system in an extended Castelbuono family whereby some individuals use a surname "Bertola", others use "Citta", and others use "Citta Bertola". And some change their name during the course of their life. My bad news is that searching for a needle in the haystack of Cittas is not how I can afford to allocate my research time.

And just my luck, elsewhere with these Castelbuono Bertolas, there is a different melange of dual/compound naming comprised of Bertola, Fiore, Bertola Fiore and Fiore Bertola. This included a direct lineage of my ancestors; thankfully Fiore is not nearly as conmon as Citta, but still I have not gone back and fine-toothcombed the unindexed records of the early 19th century. Too labor intensive, not sufficient bang for the buck, I don't have unlimited time for such things.

Parker

[MarcuccioV]

I'm not sure if the definition of "foundling" extends to someone whose parents are unknown (or at least undocumented). I don't have anybody named "Proietti" in my extended ancestral families.

Parker

"Foundling" in my case refers to a child of unknown parentage. "Proietti(a)" (Project) is simply the surname our commune (Valmontone, Lazio) used for such infants. Other communes use other names, I have seen Trovatto(a), De Maria, etc for foundlings.

In this case it was a direct change of an existing family surname (unrelated to a foundling)...

[MarcuccioV]

Just to throw a wrench in things, on some of the notarial documents the surname Tessitori is Latinized as "Textori", and further occasionally spelled "Testori". Testori is found in Lazio, and to a lesser extent Sicily, but not in Campania...