Milanese Notaries 1396-1635

by Maridonna Benvenuti

© 2004 Andrea Hicks, all rights reserved.

These men's names are taken from a list of the notaries who had drafted deeds for the ducal councils from the Visconti period to the end of the duchy (1796). The names were found in documents at the archival complex of the State of Milan. The website was accessed on 12/22/02 and can be found at http://213.156.63.135/corredi/guida_htm/sezione_I.htm?reload_coolmenus. I have chosen the names recorded before 1635.

My thanks to Joshua Mittleman for his assistance. This article consists of three tables: given names, family names, and raw data.

The list of given names is alphabetical with names and their variants grouped together. All names occur only once in the data unless otherwise noted. Compound given names in late period were fairly common. This article considers Giovanni Battista 'John Baptist' and Cesare Giulio 'Caesar Julius' to be one unit. Other double given names, i.e. Pietro Francesco 'Peter Francis' do not fit into this category.

In my table of family names, I have identified the origin of each surname, where possible, at least by general type, i.e. patronymic, locative, occupational, etc. The names are listed alphabetically. Five of the Bossi and Ciocca were ducal notaries as were two each of the Legnano and Perego. The rest only occur once.

The table of raw data gives the names, date, and the number of the archive envelope in which the information was found. This list of names was taken directly off of the website and includes post-1635 names.

Please note that the spellings may be modern.

Given Names

Agostino
Alessandro
Antonio 2
Arrighino
Baldassare 2
Beltramino
   Beltrarnino This might be a misspelling of Beltramino
Bernardo
Catelano
Cesare
Cesare Giulio
Cristoforo
Francesco
Maria
Girolamo
   Gerolamo
Giacomo
Giacomo Maria
Gian Giacomo
Giorgio
Giovanni
Giovanni Ambrogio
   Giovan Ambrogio
Giovanni Battista
   Giovan Battista
Giuliano
Marco
Matteo
Nicola
Pietro Francesco
Pietro Paolo
Stefano
Virgilio

Family names

Astolfi Patronymic from the Slavonic and Croatian Stolfich.
Biraghi Locative.
Biumi
Bombello Byname meaning 'good and good-looking'.
Bossi Possibly a variant of the surname Bosi, which is from the German böse meaning wicked, hostile'. Five members of this family were notaries.
Caimi
Canobio
Carcano
Ciocca Possibly a descriptive byname meaning a tuft of hair. Five members of this family were notaries.
Confalonieri Occupational byname originally meaning 'standard bearer'.
Cremosano
Cristiani Perhaps a byname meaning 'Christian', but more often patronymic from Cristiano
Ferrario Occupational 'smith'
della Gazzada
Legnano Locative. Two members of this family were notaries.
Luino Locative.
Monetario Occupational, 'a moneyer, minter'
Perego Locative. Two members of this family were notaries.
Pessina Locative.
Regaino
Rossi Descriptive.
Sacchi Possibly from a word sacco 'coat', or 'bag', and thus occupational sack-maker'; or possibly from the German 'sacco'.
Varzi Locative.

Raw Data

Bernardo Albertone 1820-1828 scatola 1
Giacomo Maria Astolfi 1530-1563 scatole 24
Giuseppe Baciocco 1640-1654 scatole 39
Francescolo Feliciano Bendone 1633-1662 scatole 3
Giovanni Ambrogio Biraghi 1540-1587 scatole 2
Francesco Maria Biumi 1607-1608 scatole 2
Baldassare Caimi 1607-1608 scatole 2
Antonio Bombello 1460-1499 scatole 35
Beltrarnino Bossi 1548-1566 scatole 6
Pietro Francesco Bossi 1548-1566 scatole 3
Giovanni Bossi 1431-1475 scatola 1
Stefano Bossi 1478-1511 scatola 1
Virgilio Bossi 1513-1559 scatole 12
Francesco Brambilla 1667-1695 scatole 40
Pietro Brunati 1787-1791 scatole 6
Baldassare Caimi 1609-1610 scatole 10
Cesare Giulio Canobio 1602-1604 scatole 3
Giovan Battista Cantoni 1616-1713 scatole 8
Beltramino Carcano 1395-1451 scatole 13
Giuseppe Maria Casanova 1757-1771 scatole 6
Giuseppe Castellini 1763-1785 scatola 1
Catelano Cristiani 1396-1420 scatola 1
Agostino Ciocca 1421 scatola 1
Arrighino Ciocca 1440-1475 scatola 1
Pietro Paolo Ciocca 1467-1475 scatola 1
Girolamo Ciocca 1523-1535 scatola 1
Gian Giacomo Ciocca 1531-1543 scatola 1
Alessandro Confalonieri 1537-1567 scatole 62
Bernardo Cremosano 1611-1635 scatole 61
Marco Cremosano 1655-1667 scatola 1
Giovan Ambrogio Ferrario 1510-1530 scatola 1
Agostino Gariboldi 1789-1793 scatole 22
Matteo della Gazzada 1418-1499 scatole 7
G Battista Giletti 1796-1799 scatole 51
Gerolamo Legnano 1549-1568 scatole 5
Nicola Legnano 1495-1508 scatole 2
Pietro Lonati 1772 scatola 1
Francesco Antonio Lugani 1746-1786 scatole 24
Stefano Lugani 1703-1752 scatole 5
Giovan Battista Luino 1546-1563 scatole 5
Carlo Francesco Melzi 1639-1690 scatole 3
G Francesco Momo 1640-1642 scatola 1
Francesco Mercantolo 1620-1660 scatola 1
Giorgio Monetario 1484-1486 scatola 1
Carlo Negri 1772-1795 scatole 22
Giorgio Francesco Ottolini 1655-1667 scatole 35
Giuseppe Palma 1724-1738 scatola 1
Giacomo Perego 1445-1471 scatole 6
Marco Perego 1455-1497 scatola 1
Giuliano Pessina 1527-1541 scatole 14
Carlo Pia 1699-1713 scatole 2
Giuseppe Radice 1795-1800 scatole 10
Cesare Regaino 1559-1606 scatole 41
Antonio Rossi 1465-1509 scatola 1
Ludovico Rossi 1665-1684 scatole 2
Cristoforo Sacchi 1514-1542 scatole 4
Gaetano Sacchi 1779-1803 scatole 23
Filippo Antonio Secchia 1636-1639 scatole 6
Carlo Antonio Silvola 1770-1787 scatole 76
Giuseppe Spreafico, 1714-1732 scatole 5
Pietro Ambrogio Tarantola 1768-1796 scatole 58
Giovan Battista Tentorio 1733-1756 scatole 13
Giovanni Battista Varzi 1553-1558 scatola 1

Other sources used

De Felice, Emidio. Dizionario dei cognomi italiani, 1997, Arnoldo Mondadori, Editor, ISBN 88-04-42791-4.

Fucilla, Joseph G. Our Italian Surnames, Reprint by Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc., 1996, ISBN 0-8063-1187-8.

Cassell's Italian Dictionary.

Alfred Hoare. An Italian Dictioary, 2nd ed., Cambridge University Press, 1925.

Florio's 1611 Italian/English Dictionary.