Passports!

Today I was cleaning up for the great winter decoration bonanza may begin in earnest. I was moving around furniture when I came across a shoe box. I've seen it before, I've been through the papers in it before. I even remember when my husband found the box amongst my Grandfather's things. It was mostly legal papers regarding my Great-Grandfather. There was a picture in it, one each of the siblings got a copy of. I always wondered why a big chunk in the bottom left corner was white. Now I know- I have the original picture and that corner is missing.

There were other things in the box that I do not recall seeing before, even though I've gone through this box several times. I asked hubby and he doesn't remember seeing them either: Today I found the Italian Passports for my great grandparents which has their pictures and the pictures of their children. What a find! The stamps in the passports are really interesting too. What has been very interesting is finding my Great Grandmother's passport which not only has her maiden name, but also her mother's maiden name. This just opened up a whole new branch of the family tree! I just stopped to scan these: The passport cover and that nifty stamp:

I've never seen them before and just discovered them after days and days of working and feeling like I was getting close to something. Thanks to my Patrons, and to the Lare for revealing these, and so many other things, to me! Ave! Now I'm off to give thanks and explore this heretofore unknown branch of the family tree! And maybe to share some of the family picture scans with my cousins ;)

Ancestry

This is the perfect time of year to search for ancestors and knowledge of your family tree and family history. If you know how to listen, you can pick up when your ancestors reach out to you. How they do that depends on your sensitivity, your favorite forms of communication, and how urgently they want you to have the information.

Tonight I have discovered several things about my family that I did not know. Not all of it has been confirmed on this plane- I am still searching for evidence and records of certain things, but when you hear "Medici" whispered on the wind (or shouted loud enough to wake you from a nap, ahem) and some digging shows that one of your ancestors was a member of the Medici court, well, that's confirmation enough for me. I'm not claiming the Medici family as my ancestors, just sayin that's how we got onto this topic tonight.

More funtastic information has come to light on my Mother's side of the family. My Maternal Great-Grandmother's surname dates back to before the renaissance. My Maternal Great-Grandfather's surname originates, not in Naples, as I had believed, but in Sicily, specifically in Enna. I've always felt that my connection to Sicily goes beyond adoption, but I thought the connection was conferred from the family tradition I was brought into. Nice to know there's a blood connection as well.

I've also found an alternative version of the history of my own last name which not only connects it to a Templar (which the last round of research did) but discusses Templars as being rooted in the Fratres Arvales, which I blogged about the other day. Gotta love synchronicity. The author of this piece also goes on to talk about an Etruscan connection to the Paternal side of my family. Absolutely none of this is confirmed at all. I thought my last name had Greek origins and a fun legend, but this distant relative has come up with something else entirely, which I find fascinating.

Tonight my family tree has been flipped horizontally. I thought the Etruscan connection was on one side of the family, and the Sicilian side on the other. Since little of this has been confirmed by mundane research, I will take the information back to the ones who inspired tonight's search and ask for direction:

Why do I need to look here now?
Which resources can point me towards further information?

I will start with a tarot spread and likely add a pendulum reading as well.

Anyone else out here doing this kind of work? Are you communicating with your ancestors at all? More now than usual? Do you seek them out at this time of year?

Genealogy

I was going to complain about how I need to up my Italian skillz because I can hardly do family research when it takes me forever to translate a web site. No need to blog that, just to stfu and practice, right? One web site, which I've seen before, has my family's coat of arms. There's even a fun little legend about how the name started:

One two Princes kneel before you. That's what I said now.... Ack! Effing Spin Doctors...

There were two Princes, Brothers. Each had a castle on the opposite side of a river. Water grew scarce, each needed it. They fought over the river -the about to take up arms against each other fighting, not the whining to mom that he stole my water kind of fighting. My ancestor came along and built a contraption which split the river and made it flow towards both Princedoms. He was declared Master of the Water and given his own land and title. That's one story of how I became a Mastromarino. Here's our coat of arms:

(had to remove it, will upload it elsewhere! 1/26)


The page that has the coat of arms talks about the ancient origins of the name and traces it back to, I think, Thrace. It tries to follow as the name evolves into Mastromarino and other offshoots. If you're fluent in Italian, please take a look at the page and let me know your take on it. There's a whole big deal about us being related to a Templar. Interesting...

If you're in the mood for some surname fun, check out where your name is most popular in Italy and in the US: http://www.gens.labo.net/it/cognomi/

I'll post about why family lines are important, including the adopted ones, another time. Add it to my growing list of posts to post!