Angel Communications: Italian Research

Family Reunion

Sat, 29 Sep 2007 16:11:41 GMT

It was 43 years since his parents had taken my client to visit his relatives in Italy and all he had was photos from that visit made when he was just 7 years old. Phone calls to the families with the same surname in town had produced nothing but we met at the Parish church and proceeded with our investigation. By the noon that day we were eating lunch with 15 relatives, some of whom were visiting from the USA, and none of whom had ever expected to see this branch of the family again. A very emotional day.

Cemeteries

Tue, 18 Sep 2007 18:57:04 GMT

Deceased Italians are usually placed in “niches” in the cemetery, which are leased, most for 99 years allowing for at least 3 “burials”. In the newer sections of the cemetery the lease is for only 33 years earning more money for the church (or city). Once the body has decomposed, this usually takes from 10-30 years, the bones and ashes are transferred to the “ossario”, a smaller vault within the cemetery, leaving space for the next family member. Most of the niches contain a ceramic photo of the deceased along with a vase for flowers and an eternal lamp. If the lease runs out and is not renewed the bones are eventually transferred by the city (or church) to the underground, communal bone vault through a trap door in the floor. In November each of the niches are decorated with mini lights for the All Souls Day celebration on November 2^nd.

All of the above means that unless your ancestor was famous, or rich you are unlikely to find a gravestone in the cemetery or the exact location of their ashes.

1921 Census of Sora (FR)

Sun, 26 Aug 2007 12:43:21 GMT

An alphabetical list of Heads of Households (with paternity) is now available for the town of Sora. This census was created in 1921 listing Head of household, other members of household, profession, and dates of birth, and includes the address for most records. It was then used as a 'State of the Family' for the next 10 years and is invaluable for identifying possible living relatives. It includes death dates and occasionally information on family members who emigrated to USA and other countries. If, after consulting the index, you want to view the actual record there is a charge for the digital image. If you want to consult the index, please email me directly at atatangelo@hotmail.com.

How to search the LDS microfilms

Sun, 31 Dec 2006 14:55:03 GMT

Using the date of birth, order the appropriate film and go to the birth records for that date A translation of the birth certificate can be found on this site. The birth certificate will give you the names and ages of each parent. From this you should calculate the approximate age and check the birth records for that year and the year s before and after if you don’t find it right away. They had a habit of “rounding out” to the nearest 5 years so don’t be discouraged. If you don’t find them then you will have to check the marriage certificate to learn where they were born.
To find the marriage certificate start at the birth date of the child and work backwards. They often had indexes so be sure to check this first to save time. The marriage certificate will tell you where the persons were born, how old they were, and give the names of both sets of parents stating “fu” (already deceased) or “di” (still alive). The bride and groom had to provide their birth certificates and the death certificates of parents if deceased. If the father was deceased at the time of the marriage they had to produce the grandfathers death certificate also so be sure to check the PROCESSI for these documents it will save you lots of time.
Death certificates are not really necessary until you get back to the early part of 1800 when a death certificate of a parent will give you THEIR parents’ names and where they were born.

San Silvestro Papa

Sun, 31 Dec 2006 12:58:07 GMT

December 31st is the Festa of San Silvestro Papa. In Sora the parish began its celebrations at 8am with several loud bangs (fireworks), again at noon and at 6pm. San Silvestro is the Pope who converted to Christianity the mother of the Roman Emperor Costantino and it is thanks to him that Italy and the world began a rapid acceptance of Christianity.
In the local Parish Church dedicated to San Silvestro in Sora there are several paintings from 1770, and the original baptismal font in a cupboard the door of which is painted with a 17th century baptism scene. The Church also houses a painting of two local Martyrs, Santa Restituta and San Giuliano and the original cornerstone of the original monastery built on the site.

Italian Research

Tue, 05 Sep 2006 07:43:59 GMT

In 1809 when Napoleon conquered Italy he instituted Civil Registration. The birth, marriage and death records had previously been maintained by the Catholic Church. To differentiate between the numerous Giuseppe’s and Maria’s he made a law that for administration purposes a child could not be given the same name as the father. In addition all documents must show the paternity of the person. Therefore Giuseppe became Giuseppe “di” (son of) Domenico etc. This meant that if Giuseppe fathered six sons who each named one of their sons Giuseppe each of the grandchildren would be “di” a different father. While it was possible for a long-living man to have a great grandchild with exactly the same paternal name the age difference was so great as to make misidentification impossible. For researchers this naming method enables us to maintain the correct line more easily.

Marriage documents show full names of both sets of parents and give both the mother’s surname and the father and if the father is deceased also the grandfathers name. (Unlike English records which give only the father’s name.) Since all Italian women keep their birth name on marriage this further assists in identifying the correct ancestors.

Death records will give the mother’s and father’s name of the deceased and indicate the wife or husband’s name or if unmarried will often state this. They do not include the cause of death unless it is suicide or firing squad, and occasionally drowning, especially if a child. Cemetery plots usually go back only 30 years except in unusual cases. Niches or land plots are leased for periods of up to 99 years and often reused up to three times before the lease expires. The bones are removed from the niche and either placed in a family bone vault or in the communal bone vault when the space is needed for another family member.

After 1861,(unification of Italy) and sometimes before that in many towns, office staff created indexes covering a 10-year period. These indexes usually list date of event and names of both parents cutting down considerably on the research time enabling the researcher to pull names and dates without pulling the actual documents. This is useful for sibling records since photocopies are difficult to obtain although I have had good success getting permission to take digital photographs.

Surnames are very localized, for example a name found in Sora will be unknown in Avezzano. Orphans were given surnames that did not occur in the community. Usually names that when translated mean Saved (Salvato), Exposed (Esposito), Welcome (Benvenuto), Found (Trovato), Beautiful flower (Belfiore), April (Aprile) etc. making an orphan easy to identify.

The individual towns maintained these civil records with a second copy being sent to the State Archives. This means you must know the town of birth of an ancestor to begin the search. If this information is not known then a search of the military conscription records at the State Archives (depending of the province records may only be available for later years) may identify the town of birth allowing research to continue if the records exist other wise a search of towns exhibiting this surname will often work. A quick check on the internet of www.italianancestry.com can give you the surname distribution. A check at www.paginebianche.it can tell you where this name is most numerous now.

In addition, around 1861 (sometimes earlier) each town did a form of registration of its citizens much like the modern day census (Registro del Popolazione). It was usually by household and address, and unless an index was made the address is needed to find the family. Fortunately the address was often given on pre 1865 documents. This “census” did not always survive and if it did it is not always available for consultation.

Since the average generation gap is around 30 years this means that a simple search will take the family tree back into an ancestor born in the 1700’s.

In the towns that were part of the Papal States, the civil records required by Napoleon were not kept. Napoleon instituted civil records in 1809 but in 1815 he was defeated and the Papal States stopped keeping civil records even though the rest of Southern Italy (Kingdom of the Two Sicilies) continued to do so. Many of these towns destroyed the Napoleonic records. It was not until 1871 -1878 or so that the former Papal State towns started keeping civil records and for several years it was sporadic. In these towns only a search of the Church records will allow you to continue your family tree. Unfortunately, in some towns all records were destroyed during the heavy bombing in WW2 (around Cassino) including church records, many of which were sent to the Abbey of Montecassino for safekeeping. As history will tell you, Montecassino was razed to the ground and all these precious records lost. A Tribunal was set up after the war to reconstruct the civil records. This involved local people coming forward with documents and re-registering themselves. Participation was not even 25% from what I have seen and if your ancestor was not even in the country, you won’t find him or her in these reconstructed records.

Church records have only one copy in this part of Italy and can only be searched with the permission of the local priest who has the records in his possession. The records before 1900 are often written in Latin and the information given in the older documents varies according to the whim of the priest. For example, some marriage records give only the parents names while others will give also the grandparents for both the bride and groom. Death records rarely give parents names and cause of death only if unusual (drowning of a child or murder). Sometimes there are indexes, sometimes not. In some areas a census of the parish was created (Stato delle anime) for taxation purposes showing complete families but if there is no index, the search is page by page. As in the civil records a marriage index is by surname of groom, making a forward search (for living relatives) through the female line extremely difficult and slow.

On the positive side, many church records go back to 1600’s and in some parishes back to 1430.

Historical Documents

Fri, 11 Aug 2006 19:57:35 GMT

The Registro del Popolazione is a census taken about 1861 when Italy was unified. It recorded the names of all persons living in the houshold, birthdate, name of father, place of birth, occupation, and address. For the next 40 years of so this book was updated with deaths, births, marriages and chnages in civil status. It does not exist in all places, but where it does it is a valuable source of information of the family and its members. It exists in Sora, Atina, Arce, Fontechiari to name a few. It can save hours of searching in the microfilms.

Many towns still have the old Lista di Leva for the early years that can provide birthdates (for the males at least) for those born before 1809.

Sora even has the Census of Animals and chestnut trees from 1808.