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Many modern Italian names combine into one word what were originally two or more. This process was underway in the 16th century, and a significant number of names in this armorial are of this sort. I have maintained them in their recorded forms and alphabetized them as written.
The French ruled Naples until 1502. The Spanish then ruled Naples until 1707. Many of the names listed below were found all over what is now Italy. The place names indicate where historic bearers of the names were found.
Names from Greek, such as Pietro, Maddalena, and Giovanni, and from Germanic origin such as Rodolfo and Guido are now inextricably linked to Italian culture the world over. Classical names from Latin such as Laura, Augusto, and Silvia have also come down to us through the Italians (Cole 24).
What's in an Italian last name? Ask Leonardo da Vinci, Piero della Francesca, Alessandro Botticelli, or Domenico Ghirlandaio. They were all great artists of the Italian Renaissance, and their surnames paint a picture, too.
Raffaele Fontanella explains the origins of surnames from the renaissance, how dialects impacted first names and surnames.
Some surnames have multiple origins, and we do not have enough Venetian sources to know which are most likely in that region. The translations and origins given below are our best guesses, mostly based on De Felice, Fucilla, and McKee.
The main lists of names in this article were collected from Guido Ruggiero, Violence in Early Renaissance Venice, which takes its data primarily from 14th and early 15th Century Venetian records. A few names are from the 16th Century, but they are so marked.