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Archiver > GEN-ITALIAN > 2001-06 > 0991543238


From: "M Yetto" <>
Subject: Re: Need help w/meaning of a surname
Date: Sun, 03 Jun 2001 04:40:38 GMT
References: <vVcS6.6859$Rq4.1833538@news1.news.adelphia.net>


Just for clarification, that's "ietto" not "Letto" (as in bed)... :-)


"M Yetto" <> wrote in message
news:vVcS6.6859$...
> Does anyone have a guess as to the origin of my surname - Ietto? I have
> heard 2 main theories over the years:
>
> 1. A linguistics professor told a cousin that the name was likely of
> Scandanavian origin, brought to Southern Italy at the turn of the
millenium
> by Vikings. Similar names are found in other parts of the Viking raiding
> routes eg, Yeats/Yetton, etc in the UK; Jeteau in Normandy. I have often
> wondered if it had some origin from Jutes...
>
> 2. Several Italian dictionaries I have looked in list some form of Ietto
to
> mean "to throw" as in to cast a spell or to charm. Okay so they burned
one
> of my ancestors at the stake?! ;-))
>
>
> Any thoughts from the group?
>
> Color me curious...
> Mark Yetto
>
> PS - Last fall I was in my ancestral hometown, and came across an entry
in
> the parish records from 1604 for a person with the name "Yetto". Now all
of
> our family knew that the name was "originally" Ietto, and that some
> ancestors Anglicized it to Yetto here in the USA. But this entry made us
> wonder if the original spelling had been "Yetto" before "Ietto". A cousin
> in Italy suggested that the person could have come from Greece where their
> IS a "Y" in the alphabet during a period of heavy Greek settlement of
> Calabria, or that it was spelled that way at those times BECAUSE of the
> Greek influence at the time....
>
>


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