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Unusual Names
 My
wife's friend goes to a cardiologist in Naples whose
name is Adolfo
Tedesco. That surname is not uncommon in Italy.
It means "German". Geographic surnames indicating family
origin back in the middle ages are common. The most
striking one I know of in Naples is Ostrogoto—
Ostrogoth—a name presumably traceable to the Germanic
invasions of Italy at the fall of the Roman Empire. In
similar fashion in the area of Baia on the Gulf of
Naples, there are a number of compound surnames on the
order of Scotto di
(second element); that is: Scotto di Carlo, Scotto di Cerrottolo, Scotto
di Tella, etc. While the surname Scotto (Scot) is
not uncommon in Italy, the compounds derive, so they say
(and I have this story from a gentleman by the name of Amerigo Scotto di Tella),
from a shipwreck in the area centuries ago, when a band
of Scottish seaman apparently liked the area so much,
they decided to stay and marry into local families.
Back to Adolfo Tedesco. Adolf German. This was a very
good name to have in Italy between 1933 and 1943. You
can be certain that the doctor was born during those
years. No doubt he has had to put up with
good-natured—or maybe not so good-natured—ribbing since
then, however.
A cursory stroll through the Naples telephone book
reveals surnames from the slightly unorthodox Fava (Lima bean), Bavoso (slobbering)
and Mezzatesta
(half head) to sublime if unoriginal combinations of
first and surname, such as Pasquale Pasquale (Easter Easter) and
Domenico di Domenico
(Sunday of Sunday). In between are surnames such as Moccio (Snot), Malavita (Organized
Crime), Quattrocchi
(Four Eyes), Violino
(Violin), Malato
(Sick), and Mangiaterra
(Earth-eater). That last one is interesting; originally
the name was Magnaterra
(great land or property) and obviously meant
"landholder". The gn
was properly pronounced with the palatalized Spanish ñ sound (or
the ny as in
"canyon");
however,
since the local dialect inserts the same sound into the
Italian mangiare
for "eat," people assumed that the name must have meant
"earth eater" and not "land holder," so they
"corrected"(!) the spelling. For no particular reason, I
like the first and last name combinations of Armando Uomo (Man),
Antonio Sesso
(Sex), Fortunato
Capodanno (Fortunate New Year) Sergio del Bufalo,
Baldasare Della
Confusione, Bianca
Barba (White Beard), Felice Popolo (Happy People), Nello Albero (In
The Tree) and one that must be challenging to live up
to—Salvatore Delle
Donne (Saviour of Women). Also, the building
next to mine was built by an engineer with the unusual
though not unique surname Della Morte (Of Death). Then his
clever parents christened him Angelo. His name was Angel of Death.
("Uh, dear, what's your young gentleman's name? That's
nice. Well, run along, but be back before the moon
rises, won't you?")
The worst handle to have attached to your person in
Italy is the surname Bocchino.
Besides being the proper word for 'cigarette holder' or
'mouthpiece of a musical instrument', it is the vulgar
slang term for 'fellatio'. There are seventeen of them
in the Naples phone book, and an entire segment of a
recent TV program was dedicated to the problems of a
gentleman with that surname whose parents had seen fit
to give him the first name of "Generoso". There
are also a number of entries in the local phone book for
Zoccola. It
means, precisely, 'slut', and a newspaper article
on this subject speculated that even if a man were
perfect in all else, he might have difficulty in getting
a woman to marry him, because no woman wants to be
introduced in society as "Mrs. Slut". Almost as bad is
the surname Mastronzo,
since it contains the word stronzo, a vulgar word for a piece of
excrement as well as the most common vulgar insult in
Italian, equivalent to calling someone "asshole" in
English. The phonebook contains a number of variations
such as Mastranzo;
the vowel change is almost certainly the result of a
legal name change (which really does little else but get
people to remark, "Gee, you must have changed your name,
huh?").
A victim of a slightly different sort is Paolo Porcellini,
whose surname means 'little pigs' and who has two
brothers. It so happens that the Italian version of the
famous Disney jingle 'Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf'
starts 'Siam tre
piccoli porcellini…' ('We are three little
pigs'), rousing choruses of which, sung by mean-spirited
classmates, inevitably awaited the Piglet Brothers on
many a school day. Finally, other disconcerting Italian
surnames are Piscione
and Cacace,
which evoke the acts of excretion; Schifone, which
means 'most disgusting'; Cazzato, Cazzola, or Cazzoli, all of which recall the most
common slang term for 'penis'; and Finocchio, the
vegetable 'fennel', but also the common
disparaging term for 'homosexual'.
Why not, then, simply change your name? In Italy, there
is an awesome battle of documents to be fought. In large
Italian cities, about 6 or 7 people a year apply to
modify their surname, 50 a year to change their surname
completely, and 100 a year their first name. Even after
the change, creating a new identity for yourself is so
overwhelming that most simply forget about it. There are
new driving licenses to get, insurance, bankbooks, tax
forms, a new phone listing—in short, every shred of
official paper with your name on it has to be amended.
Worse, you have to deal with the infamous Hall of
Records 'Bureausaurus' (as they are so aptly nicknamed
in Italy), someone who explains to you patiently that
you can't get a document attesting to your new name
unless you first present a document attesting to your
new name.
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