CROATIA-L Archives

Archiver > CROATIA > 2004-08 > 1092459183


From:
Subject: RE: CROATIA-L
Date: Sat, 14 Aug 2004 00:53:15 -0400 (EDT)
References: <3.0.3.32.20040813205003.00ad04d8@snowcrest.net>
In-Reply-To: <3.0.3.32.20040813205003.00ad04d8@snowcrest.net>


Hello Karen,

I'm forwarding your message and my reply to the Croatia-L list so that
others can give you advice too.

I have no Croatian background, so you may want to run this by someone who
knows the language, or at least Croatian naming customs. My first thought
was that Mate may be Croatian counterpart of Matthew. In Croatian New
Testament, Matthew appears as Matej, so Mate is a likely diminutive.

Then I came across the Croatia-in-English website, which lists "Mato" with
the following comment:

Most Matos became Martins in the States even though Matthew and Martin are
unrelated linguistically. I guess, this is good news for you!

<http://www.croatia-in-english.com/gen/names-frames.html>;

There are handwriting samples for "Mato", and I'd say, it could be misread
as "Mate", although on Mary's manifest it is clearly "Mate". Perhaps, it
is not a big deal in Croatian, and both variants are used... Any comments,
anyone?

Regards,

Bohdana


> Bohdana- was very interested in your response to "Mary" regarding her
> grandaunt Marija Dosen and her son "Mate".
>
> I have been searching for my grandfather coming through Ellis Island and I
> did find one listing for MATE HOFER that looked promising.
>
> My question is - does "Mate" translate into "Martin" in English? The only
> name we had for my grandfather is Martin
>
> If you could give me some direction, I would deeply appreciate it.
> Thankyou in advance.
> Karen Hofer Heiser
>
>
>
>

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