Naming illegitimate children late 1800's

[trecaromia]

Hi Mary:
I noticed on the record "levatrice" midwife: The father or the midwife had to show the infant in person to the civil authorities. If the father was deceased "fu" would have been used in front of his name. Have you found baptismal records for the children. Due to high infant mortality the infants were baptised early. Keep digging and the answers will come to you.

[ms_mary58]

I have not searched baptismal records, but I will have to get more information about how to do so. Thank you for the tip!

[DCPandaFan]

Great thread!
I remember the first time I saw "da una donna che non consente di essere nominata" in an Italian birth record. I almost fell over laughing! I did not realize then that this was the stock language used by the town officials to identify a child whose mother did not want to be officially identified. After seeing this phrase a few more times, the shock value of it kind of wore off and then later on I saw similar language in an old forms book, so I knew the town official wasn't just being catty or sarcastic or nasty about the circumstances of the birth.
Yes, the levatrice (midwife) presented the child when the father was not available. It was part of her job to do so. Midwife presentation is quite common after 1870, when many fathers went abroad to work. The town official always asks her why she is presenting the child in the father's stead. Sometimes the record will state where the father is, possibly forming the link between the original family in Italy and a branch of the family abroad. This is one of the reasons why tracking down the births of your grand-uncles and grand-aunts is so important, even if you already know who their parents are. These details add much to flesh out the family story, including dates, places, etc.

[Italysearcher]

Searching baptismal records will not help you since the priest was working with the town officials to protect these fallen women from the results of their 'sin'. SInce the baby was always baptized after the registration the priest used the name provided form the town. The Godmother was usually a casual member of the parish.

DCPandafan, it wasn't that the women didn't want to be identified, by law, if they weren't married, they could not be identified. If the father presented the child, the child was given his surname and the mother was not identified (even if they had been married in the curch). If the midwife presented the child it was given a ficticious name and often returned to the mother! If the child was 'recognized' later this will be recorded on the town's copy of the birth act, but not necessarily on the second copy that was microfilmed at the State Archives.

[VotM]

We have an illegitimate birth in our tree, late 1800s in Italy, where a lot of digging in records finally linked the child to the bloodline mother/ancestor.

If it's not personal, what type records did you locate that linked the child to the family line?

I am curious, as there is one foundling in my maternal line that I would be interested to see if he links to either of his foster parents. (He most likely doesn't link to both, else I would have expected him to have been legitimized at some point.)

[Italysearcher]

Foundlings were not always recognized even if they lived with their natural parents for a variety of reasons. Foster parents were paid for raising a child so they may have been afraid to legitimise in case they had to repay the money. Have you read Ange Coniglio's book?
The child may have been the illegitimate child of a relative for instance.

[VotM]

If the father was deceased "fu" would have been used in front of his name.

Generally true, but not always. This ommission is more commonly found on marriage records, but I wouldn't take it as a given that the father was still alive at the child's birth due to the absence of the word "fu".

DCPandafan, it wasn't that the women didn't want to be identified, by law, if they weren't married, they could not be identified. If the father presented the child, the child was given his surname and the mother was not identified (even if they had been married in the curch).

Again, not always... at least in Sicily, anyway. There are two instances in my extended family from the early 1900's where the wording appears to translate to something along the lines of the mother not wanting to be identified (e.g. "della sua unione naturale con donna che non consente di assere nominata").

The term I do see most commonly in cases where the couple is not wed in the eyes of Italian law is "unione naturale".

[VotM]

There are two instances in my extended family from the early 1900's where the wording appears to translate to something along the lines of the mother not wanting to be identified (e.g. "della sua unione naturale con donna che non consente di assere nominata").

I should have added that this language only occurs for the first two children; not the latter ones born prior to their marriage. Additionally, birth records for two other relatives born in another town -- in about the same range of years as the two instances I noted earlier -- list both the father and mother even though they were not married. So while there may have been some advantage to "official deniability" for a mother in the birth records, I'm not yet convinced it was a national legal requirement to conceal an unwed mother's name if the father presented the child.

[ms_mary58]

In 1901, when my grandfather's youngest sister was born, my ggm was listed as the mother, and it was also stated "nubile" which I assume indicates she was unmarried. Obviously, I do not know whether this was different because of a change in the law or for some other reason.

[Italysearcher]

Different areas had different ways of wording the absence of one parent on a birth record to comply with the law.
Some towns stated that the wonman or man did not want to be identified, others state, cannot be identifed,
others like the above state that the child was born of a natural (unwed) union but that is always the case with the exception of the virgin Mary!
There are many articles about this and even books. It was a law designed to protect unwed women from the evidence of their 'sin'.

[VotM]

Application of such a law may also have been uneven, at least between 1900 and 1904. Chronologically, the four births I know of involving an unwed mother in that time period toggle between the "declines to be identified" and an explcit listing of both the father and mother. Geographically, the two births which mention both parents are from the same comune.

Starting in 1906 both parents were mentioned in births in the "declines to be identified" comune... but it turns out the mother was listed on the record as the father's wife on those births, even though the couple did not marry under Italian law until 1917.

[Italysearcher]

In Italy it would seem that all laws are open to interpretation!
This applies also to anagrafe offices. Some give me open access to records over 70 years old. Others guard them like the crown jewels even when the records can be found on line!

[isaballe]

My grandfather was a foundling, born in Sicily in 1882. He was given a fake name that is now our family name.

I'm wondering what records you used to link the child to his biological birth father.

Hello Ms. Mary,
We have an illegitimate birth in our tree, late 1800s in Italy, where a lot of digging in records finally linked the child to the bloodline mother/ancestor. The illegitimate child was given a strange 'name' that wasn't one in the family (and as we later learned was not the name of our eventually 'discovered' birth-father). Interestingly, the illegitimate child grew up in and among the family members and the 'name' given exists today in descendants!
So, it was a contrived name/word that essentially referred to nothing at all that gained legitimacy through generations! Can you imagine the years and searches it took to unscramble that puzzle?! So, stay with it and if the records are there to find, you'll eventually uncover them!
Can't make these stories up!

[Italysearcher]

Unless the child was raised by his natural parents as a foundling so they could receive money for fostering him/her it is unlikely you can locate the birth parents. Even today in Italy child abandonment is anonymous if the woman wants it to be.

[isaballe]

Hi Ann, that's what I had read which is why I found the earlier post very interesting. What records had she dug through to figure out who her grandfathers biological parents were? Found it interesting.