Professional paper
The Surnames of the Inhabitants of the City and Island of Rab from the XVth to the XXth Century
Davor Frankulin Travaš
Abstract
In the introductory part of his article the author puts forth the results of the survey of Rab surnames which was assembled by Prof Lucijan Marčić in his study “Antropogeografska ispitivanja po severodalmatinskim ostrvima (Rab, Pag i Vir)” published as the 38th book in the Srpski etnografski zbornik in 1926. In this study Marčić copied out three short listings of the Rab nobility from 1443, 1553 and for the period between 1600 and 1780. After this he listed the names of the Rab plebs according to the book of the guild of St Christopher in Rab, published another list of the Rab plebeians from 1700 and a listing of Rab common folk for the period between 1600 to 1780. Although he worked on the study of Rab surnames for two years, copying out the old Rab registers on the island itself and in the Zadar Archive, it is surprising that Marčić did not record the Rab surnames from the 9 registers of birth of people baptized and the other registers of those married and deceased on the island of Rab which are today stored in the State Archive in Zadar. In order to fill in the evident shortcomings of the study, the author, supplementing Marčić’s listings of Rab nobility and plebian surnames, lists surnames from different municipal and church records which appear in these records throughout the XVIIth and XVIIIth century and which are today stored in the State Archive in Rijeka. Nevertheless the basis of this study are the surnames to be found in the first five Rab records of baptism, beginning with the first record of baptisms and marriages in Rab from 1569 and concluding with the book of records which ends with 1676. Afterwards the author makes note from the Rab record of baptisms from 1637 to 1801 of double Rab surnames which represent a kind of bridge between Medieval and contemporary Rab surnames to 1925 as recorded by Lucijan Marčić. Double Rab surnames confirm the continuity of the majority of today’s Rab surnames from the XVth to the XXth century. They are particularly abundant in the XIXth century and in the records of baptisms of both Rab and its neighboring villages (parishes) which are stored partially in the State Archive in Zadar and in the State Archive in Rijeka. At the end of the article the author lists in alphabetical order those Rab surnames which during four centuries have not been changed since their initial inscription into the record of birth in 1569.
Keywords
Hrčak ID:
12127
URI
Publication date:
19.9.2003.
Visits: 31.263 *