A name in Italian consists of a given name (nome) and a surname (cognome). Surnames are normally written after given names. Occasionally in official documents, the surname may be written before given names. In speech, the use of given name before family name is standard.
Italian names are not entirely equivalent to ancient Latin ones, for instance, the Italian nome is not analogous to the ancient Roman nomen, since the former is the given name (distinct between siblings) while the latter the family name (inherited, thus shared by all siblings).
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Many Italian male given names end in -o but can also end in -e (for example Achille, Aimone, Alceste, Alcide, Amilcare, Amintore, Annibale, Aristotele, Astorre, Baldassare, Beppe, Carmine, Cesare, Clemente, Daniele, Dante, Davide(David), Emanuele, Ercole, Ettore, Felice, Gabriele, Gaspare, Gastone, Gentile, Giosuè, Giuseppe, Leone, Melchiorre, Michele, Oddone, Ottone, Pasquale, Raffaele, Salomone, Salvatore, Samuele, Scipione, Simone, Ulisse, Vitale, Vittore), in -i (for example Dionigi, Gianni, Giovanni, Luigi, Nanni, Neri, Ranieri) and in -a (for example Andrea, Battista, Elia, Enea, Evangelista, Luca, Mattia or Nicola). Some names, usually of foreign origin, end with a consonant, such as Christian/Cristian, Igor, Ivan, Loris, Oscar, and Walter/Valter.
Female names end in -a but can also end in -e, as is the case with Adelaide, Adele, Agnese, Alice, Beatrice, Berenice, Geltrude, Irene, Matilde and Rachele for example, in -i (for example Noemi), or even with a consonant (e.g. Nives, Ester).
A few names end with an accented vowel, for instance Niccolò and Giosuè.
Almost every base name can have a diminutive form ending with -ino/-ina or -etto/etta as in Paolino/Paoletto and Paolina/Paoletta from Paolo and Paola, -ello/-ella, as in Donatello/Donatella from Donato and Donata, or -uccio/-uccia, as in Guiduccio from Guido. The forms -uzzo/-uzza, as in Santuzza from Santa, are typical of Sicilian dialect.
The most common names are[1]:
This is true, although not many children happen to have these names nowadays.
Since the ancient Romans had a very limited stock of given names (praenomina), very few modern Italian given names (nomi) are derived directly from the classical ones. A rare example would be Marco (from Marcus). Some nomi were taken from classical clan names (nomina)—for their meanings or because they are euphonic, not necessarily because the nameholder is the descendant of the clan, such as Emilio/Emilia (from Aemilius), Valerio/Valeria (from Valerius), Claudio/Claudia (from Claudius), Orazio (from Horatius), and Fabio (from the cognomen Fabius), Flavio/Flavia (from Flavius).
Some given names have the prefix "Gian-" such as Gianluca and Gianfranco where "Gian" is short for Giovanni. Another prefix is "Pier-" (short for Pietro), as in Pierpaolo, Pierangelo, Pierantonio and so on.
Italian unisex names are very rare (a few examples are Celeste and Andrea) , but the feminine name Maria is common as a masculine second name, as in Gianmaria, Carlo Maria, Anton Maria, etc.
Italy has the largest collection of surnames (cognomi) in the world, with over 350,000.[2][3] Men—except slaves—in ancient Rome always had hereditary surnames, i.e., nomen (clan name) and cognomen (side-clan name). However, the multi-name tradition was lost by the Middle Ages and it was not until the 1564 Council of Trento that registration of surnames became mandatory in parishes.[4]
A large number of Italian surnames end in i, due to the medieval Italian habit of identifying families by the name of the ancestors in the plural (which have an -i suffix in Italian). Most likely the surnames end in "i" due to the old latin genitive. For instance, Filippo from the Ormanno family (gli Ormanni) would be called "signore Filippo degli Ormanni" ("Mr. Filippo of the Ormannos"). In time, the middle possessive portion ("of the") was dropped, but surnames became permanently pluralized and never referred to in the singular, even for a single person. Filippo Ormanno would therefore be known as Filippo Ormanni.[5] Some families, however, opted to retain the possessive portion of their surnames, for instance Lorenzo de' Medici literally means "Lorenzo of the Medici" (de' is a contraction of dei, also meaning "of the"; c.f. The Medicis).
Some common suffixes indicate endearment (which may also become pluralized and receive an -i ending), for example:
Other endings are characteristic of certain regions:[2]
Like most other European surnames, patronymics are common. Originally they were indicated by a possessive, e.g., Francesco de Bernardo, meaning "Francis (the son) of Bernard". De Luca ("[son] of Luke") remains one of the most common Italian surnames. However, de ("of") was often dropped and suffixes added, hence de Bernardo evolved to be Bernardo and eventually pluralized as Bernardi (see Suffixes above).
The origin or residence of the family gave rise to many surnames, e.g.,
Ancestors' occupation was also a great source of surnames.
Nicknames, referring to physical attributes or mannerism, also gave rise to some family names, e.g., Rossi (from rosso "redhead"), Basso ("short"), Caporaso ("shaved head"), Pappalardo ("lard-eater" or most likely it derives from a Greek pappas aleardos, a noble priest ), Rumore ("Noise"), and Barbagelata ("frozen beard").
Few family names are still in the original Latin e.g. Santorum, De Juliis, Canalis, or De Laurentiis reflecting that the family name has been preserved from Medieval Latin sources as a part of their business or household documentation or church records.
Beginning in the Renaissance, when referring to others by their surnames alone, Italians used a definite article as well (in the singular, il for most parts, and l' before vowels).[5] Mario Russo, therefore, would have been called il Russo ("the Russo"), especially in literary circles and in writing. Given names were rarely preceded by an article. Il Mario Russo was considered by learned Italians to be erroneous, while il Russo Mario correct. However, in northern Italy, given names—especially females' names—were (and still are) preceded by articles (la Maria, la Gianna).[7]
Names that are derived from possessions of noble families normally never had articles preceding them such as Farnese (from a territorial holding) and Cornaro (from a bishopric). Articles were omitted for those surnames with an identifiable foreign origin (including Latin ones) such as Cicerone.[5]
This practice somewhat resembles the Greek custom of placing definite articles before all names (see Greek names). This Greco-Italian practice even spread to French in the 17th century, especially in writings regarding figures in literature and painting such as le Poussin.[5]
The practice of using articles before surnames was less common in ordinary conversation and middle-class speech. After the early 19th century (Napoleonic era), the custom started to dwindle in all contexts and by the 100s had basically died out, except in the most formal documents (such as legal proceedings), and some exceptions (il Petrarca and, less often, il Boccaccio).[5]
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