[LUTE] Re: Frank from Milan

[Roman Turovsky]

To tell you how I know this:
Some 10 years ago I embarked on a search for a branch of the family that 
was missing for 80 years in South Africa (their surname was SAUTSCHECK, 
and the search was successful, all SouthAfrican cousins were found! (the 
few NorthAmerican were not...)).
In the process I came into contact with professional 
historians/genealogists, and have been bluntly informed by them that 
THERE WERE NO NAME CHANGES AT ELLIS ISLAND, for aforementioned reasons.
What was in fact more common is that many people were traveling with 
forged, bought or stolen documents. There were horse-thieves and 
revolutionaries of many colors among our ancestors.
RT


On 5/8/2013 3:15 PM, Dan Winheld wrote:
Name checking against a ship's manifest sounds too logical to be 
dismissed. More likely mangling happened during hasty, crowded 
embarkations; where legality & taxonomic scrupulousness were more 
ephemeral- but the errors only coming to light at Ellis Island, where 
the shouting itself (according to descendants of the original 
Choderowski to Toder transformation) finally occurred. Naturalization? 
Sure- passport office? Not so sure- but maybe any old spelling just to 
expedite getting out of the old country.

 Congratulations on bringing Turovsky through the tunnel unscathed, 
and we know my grandad was himself to blame for surname self-mangling. 
As one of my wife's other relatives once said ruefully in regard to a 
surprise spelling- "Vell, I haff alveys pronounced mine wubbleyous mit 
a "Vee".

Dan


On 5/8/2013 11:33 AM, r.turov...@gmail.com wrote:
Dan,
The purported "Ellis Island" name manglings is a myth.
Every immigrant's name had to be and was matched to the ship's 
manifest, and any deviation was massively illegal.
So any changes people claim were made either at naturalization, or at 
the passport office in the "old country".
Cheers,
RT


On 5/8/2013 12:05 PM, Dan Winheld wrote:
For a while (in the Siena book, anyway) Francesco was "da Parigi"- 
but in the end just a vacation- "Busman's Holiday". And of course, 
Alberto da Ripa- who stayed in France, but then Francophoned  to "de 
Rippe", like Jean Paul Paladin- "Had lute, would travel". It can get 
complicated; Ottaviano dei Petrucci- da Fossombrone & Venezia.

Some European surnames imposed on the unwilling were less than 
complimentary- Katzenellenbogen (Cat's Elbow) for example. And in 
the United States there is a whole class of newly manufactured names 
based solely on language mangling at Ellis Island by overworked & 
undereducated immigration officials. My wife's mother's family name 
"Choderowski" is now "Toder". My own grandfather, fluent in Russian 
and French, but not yet English, attempted to anglicise the family 
name from "Winogradski" to Winheld. Swing and a miss; no one to 
blame but himself- "Winheld" has no meaning in any terrestrial tongue.

Danielito de New York, but "da Berkeley" since 1987.


On 5/8/2013 5:24 AM, Christopher Wilke wrote:
     Tobiah,
        Nothing wrong with calling him "da Milano," although in 
actually
    usage he's one of the few, like Michelangelo or Josquin, who are
    frequently referred to by first name. We do say, "da Vinci." 
Yes, this
    literally translates to "of ______," but place names were - and 
are -
    common surnames. They happen in most European languages, i.e. the
    French "de Visee," "de Gaulle," etc. Sometimes, the modifier 
might be
    honorific or an indication of noble lineage; sometimes not. 
Anton von
    Webern had to drop his "von" because of Austrian government 
regulation
    following WWI.
       The first part may be left off, but this is optional and 
largely
    dictated by tradition. We usually refer to Giovanni Pierluigi as
    "Palestrina" and seldom "da Palestrina," and it is more common 
to hear
    of "Beethoven" rather than "van Beethoven" - which is actually 
a Dutch,
    rather than German name. (Or you could go with "Ludwig van," 
like in a
    Clockwork Orange.) On the other hand, one never hears about "Gogh"
    without his "van."
    Chris
    Dr. Christopher Wilke D.M.A.
    Lutenist, Guitarist and Composer
    www.christopherwilke.com
    --- On Tue, 5/7/13, Tobiah <t...@tobiah.org> wrote:

      From: Tobiah <t...@tobiah.org>
      Subject: [LUTE] Frank from Milan
      To: "'Lute Net'" <lute@cs.dartmouth.edu>
      Date: Tuesday, May 7, 2013, 10:43 PM

    Ok, my last college class was 20 year ago now.  I thought
    that I was told that "Francesco Canova da Milano" basically
    meant "Francesco Canova from Milan (Italy)".  I was reading the
    surprisingly brief wikipedia article about the aforementioned
    individual, and I came across this:
    A composition called "Canzona by Francesco da Milano" (better 
known as
    the song "The City of Gold") is commonly misattributed to da 
Milano.
    So, if I am not grossly mistaken about my interpretation of the
    entire handle with which we refer to the beloved 'Frank', then
    I wonder if it can at all be correct to refer to him as
    "da Milano".  Wouldn't that be like one of you referencing
    this letter and remarking that it was written by "From 
California"?
    I expect much from the ever flowing fount of knowledge and wisdom
    that is this list!
    Thanks,
    Tobiah
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References

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