Language identification challenge (Answers)

 All three examples from this week's language identification challenge are taken from records on FamilySearch.

1. Italian - Italy, Caserta, Gricignano d'Aversa, Civil Registration (Comune), 1809-1929

First, the similarities to Latin and French should be pretty clear.  We can conclude that it's a Romance language. First, let's compare the words for "year" in a few Romance languages.

Catalan any
French an
Italian anno
Portuguese ano/anno
Romanian an 
Spanish año

Based on the forms above, the language is either Italian or Portuguese.  Now let's look at the words for "thousand".

Italian mille
Portuguese mil

So, it's Italian.


2. Dutch - Netherlands, Gelderland Province Civil Registration, 1811-1950

First, the similarities to English and German show that it's a Germanic language.  Let's look at word for "year".  In many languages, the English Y sound is represented by J.

Danish år
Dutch jaar
English year
Frisian jier
German Jahr
Icelandic ár
Norwegian år
Swedish år

It's Dutch. 

3. Portuguese - Portugal, Coimbra, Catholic Church Records, 1459-1911

This is a little tricky.  In modern Portuguese "year" is spelled with one N (ano), but in older records you will find it with two Ns (anno). If possible, it is useful to consult an older dictionary like this one available through Google Books.  In this case, we go through the same procedure as with Italian.  Another good marker of Portuguese is do, which is a combination of the preposition de "of" and the masculine singular article o "the". 

Tombstone Tuesday - Jean Lacoste and Anne Courcelle

Jean Lacoste and his wife, Anne Courcelle, are entombed at St. Louis Cemetery #1 in New Orleans, Louisiana. The vault inscription is typical of French inscriptions found in this historic cemetery.  For the most part, it can be translated directly into English without much trouble.  The phrase "Ici Repose" is literally "Here Lies".  The only major difference between the French original and English translation is the use of the definite article before the date in French.  For example, we find "le 2 Juin 1785",  not just "2 Juin 1785". The abbreviated style is also very similar to that of English inscriptions described in an earlier post (here).

Past participles in French

This abbreviated style is achieved by using a "past participle".  In English this form is usually formed by adding -ed. In many cases it is exactly the same as the past tense (died vs. died).  However, in other cases it is distinct from the past tense, like born vs. bore, been vs. was/were, sung vs. sang, etc. In French you can often identify the past participle by the ending -é, although like English there are many exceptions.  In place of born we find né and in place of  died, décédé.  Another wrinkle is the fact that the past participle in French changes depending on whether it describes a man or a woman.  The feminine form of the past participle is created by adding -e.  Thus, for Anne Courcelle we have née and décédée, the feminine forms.  

This pattern for inscriptions can be extended to other languages, especially languages closely related to French such as Italian and Spanish.  In an Italian inscription in the same cemetery (here),  we find the same basic style using participles.  Like French, the Italian past participles also have special masculine and feminine forms, nato and nata (feminine) "born" and morto and morta (feminine) "died".

Ici Repose

JEAN LACOSTE,

né á Bordeaux le 2 Juin 1785
décédé le 10 Aout 1850.
son épouse
ANNE COURCELLE,
née le 21 Juin 1778.
décédée le  10 Juillet 1857.

Here Lies
JEAN LACOSTE,
born in Bourdeaux June 2, 1785
died August 10, 1850
his wife
ANNE COURCELLE
born June 21, 1778
died July 10, 1857

Tombstone Tuesday - Sciaccaluga family vault

I recently visited New Orleans and had a chance to explore St. Louis Cemetery #1. Although the city is best known for its French heritage, the city has long been home to a wide variety of communities, including Italians, Irish and Germans. Walking through the cemetery, you'll find that most of the inscriptions are in French and English, but this masks a much richer heritage, which is told by the names you encounter. Not surprisingly many immigrants chose to use the language of the larger community, which was first French and later English. There are even a good number of inscriptions in French for people with clearly British names.

Among the vaults was one inscribed with Italian, the vault of the Sciaccaluga family. The earliest inscriptions are in Italian with last set of inscriptions in English. I want to concentrate on two of the Italian inscriptions:

Filomena Cuneo,
Sposa di G. Sciaccaluga
Nativa di Genova, Italia
Morta il 25 Aprile 1897
Di Anni 53

Guiseppe Sciaccaluga
Nativo di Genova
Morto Decmb. 18 1914
Di Anni 80

The inscription is very easy to understand:

Filomena Cuneo,
Wife of G. Sciaccaluga
Native of Genoa, Italy
Died April 25, 1897
Aged 53

Giuseppe Sciaccaluga
Native of Genoa
Died Dec. 18, 1914
Aged 80

There are a few interesting things in these inscriptions. Notice the differences between the two inscriptions. As in other Romance languages, Italian has grammatical gender. Both nativa "native" and morta "dead" end with -a for Filomena, but nativo and morto end with an -o for Giuseppe. In this case -a is the feminine ending and -o is the masculine ending.

Perhaps, less obvious is that the husband's name is spelled strangelly. Giuseppe is spelled "Guiseppe", the "i" and "u" are reversed. There are also differences in how the date is presented and the abbreviation used for December is unexpected. In Italian, the word for December is dicembre, so it is odd that the abbreviation used is "Decb.". It seems likely that the inscription was done by someone who did not know Italian and perhaps at this date there was no one in the family to guide the inscriber properly.

It is always good to keep in mind that a language might get a little mangled in the wrong hands and that knowledge of a language tends to decline in an immigrant family over time.