My Genealogy

Saturday, April 21, 2007

The Elusive Debonos...

I could not find the marriage of Ignatio Debono and his wife Joanna Zammit, parents of Maria Debono whose birth is shown below. Then I remembered a rule that I learnt by experience:

When looking for a marriage of a newborn's parents you could be lucky and find them marrying soon before - if the newborn is their first born.

Or they could've married 20 years earlier - if the newborn was their youngest child...

Or they could've married in another parish.

With this in mind, I went to look for further siblings to Maria...

and I found...

lots...


  • Gregorius Aloysius Antonius Albertus born 1797
  • Paola Magdalena Caterina born 1794
  • Maria Anna Francisca born 1791
  • Vinartus Pasquali Bartolomeus Domincus born 1788
  • Joseph Bartolomeo Antonius born 1786
  • Petris Michel Felix born 1784
  • Joanne Maria Josephus Bartoloemo born 1782
Thus Maria was the youngest of 8 children. I searched the marriage between the parents Ignatio and Joanna in the marriage registry of Attard from 1782 backwards, but to no avail.

But from the births of her sibilngs, I gleaned some clues as to the origins of Maria's parents. One of the godparents was a certain Paoli Debono from Casali Pinto. Another was Joseph Zammit, son of Bartolomeo and Maria, also from Casali Pinto.

If you haven't seen the clues yet, Paoli shares the same surname as Ignatio, and Joseph shares the same surname as the mother's maiden surname: Joanna Zammit.

Could these two be the brother and sister of Maria's parents?

If so, then my research will take me elsewhere: Casali Pinto.

Casali Pinto refers to the town to whom the Grand Master Emmanuel Pinto de Fonseca gave his name and made it a city: Qormi

Will I find the marriage of Ignatio and Joanna Zammit in the parish records of Qormi?

First I need to identify which parish to visit: Qormi has two parishes: St George and St Sebastian. A visit to the parish website reveals that St Sebastian was built in 1889, thus it's too late in the day. The parish that interests me is St George, which was already existant in 1436.

8 comments:

Unknown said...

ignazio and joanna were married at st paul CURMI 9/9/1781
son of gio maria + and dominica
joanna of alberto ZAMMIT an maria

alberto and maria married in 1743 same place

I have marriages in curmi from 1565 to 1803

yours josyanne Massa

Jon Barbara said...

Many thanks for that info!

CURMI definitely refers to QORMI if it is a city - there is also a surname Curmi.

Quite strange that you should report the location as being St Paul - when the two parishes are and have always been two: St George and St Sebastian (since 1880s).

I will defintely visit the St George parish to confirm the marriage of Ignatio and Joanna and research their roots there.

Unknown said...

as I said I have the films taken from the collection Adami up to 1565 or something like that ..
but I am at the sea side for the week till next wednesday ..

I was also surpised that it was written ST PAULO at the first page of the collection, now may be it was the name in 1565 ? and changed after ???

by the way I am interested by your marriage AQUILINA francesco to rosea GALDES
just by memory I think it is in 1817 in garghur .......... all my AQUILINA come from gharghur as well as the MULA then went to tunisia

I did already the transcription of the garghur marriages and i wrote down rosea GALEA, may be i did a mistake ?? I will check next week when I will be home

josyanne

Jon Barbara said...

Ah, the Adami Collection - I see.

I will ask about the San Paulo when I visit the parish...

RE: "marriage AQUILINA francesco to rosea GALDES"... where did you see them? because I am not aware I had them in my tree!

Unknown said...

see your message from the 6 june 2006 on gen forum malta ?
gone to algeria .........

josyanne

Jon Barbara said...

I see... and I'm right - it's not my family tree :)

It's a favor I owed to a french lady who was seeking her own maltese ancestry.

The date coincides: AQUILINA Francisco born 27 May 1817 in MALTA - but she had no details as to the place. His parents were AQUILINA Emmanuel and FOLGO (or FOLGA) Anna.

Francisco's death was in Alger on 15 July 1887. His wife GALDES Guiseppa was born circa 1819
also in Malta.

If you could lend some more details on this after your seaside holiday (I hope it's a holiday so you're enjoying yourself :) you would make an elderly french lady very happy!

Jon Barbara said...

The genealogical information regarding Francisco Aquilina can be found on the french lady's geneanet tree at
http://gw.geneanet.org/index.php3?b=emmael&lang=fr;p=francisco;n=aquilina

Jon Barbara said...

Another visit to the Attard Parish records has taught me that Ignazio Debono died in Attard on 12th February 1820 at the age of approx 76 years.

This would make him about 37 years old on his wedding day.