Diana:
Could you please tell us what your research shows regarding the geographical
dispersion of Carrico families in Italy?...if you have that information.
Are you aware of any researchers who have investigated the surname in Italy?
it sure does look like Italy is a prime candidate as the "mother
country"
for our Carrico ancestors.
Thanks,
Fred Carrico
Colorado Springs, CO
-----Original Message-----
From: carrico-bounces(a)rootsweb.com [mailto:carrico-bounces@rootsweb.com] On
Behalf Of Diana Gale Matthiesen
Sent: Monday, June 04, 2007 7:26 PM
To: carrico(a)rootsweb.com
Subject: Re: [CARRICO] Another Look at Origins
We could construct many scenarios to explain the appearance of Peter CARRICO
in
Maryland in 1674, some more plausible than others, but the problem is the
inability to prove any of them. All we really know for certain is that
Samuel
Dobson paid to get him here. That and the fact that his DNA indicates he is
not
your typical Anglo-Saxon immigrant, but someone from southern Europe or
points
east.
But let me correct something, if I've given the wrong impression. The
reason I
focus on Portugal, Spain, and Italy is that those are the only countries I
know
of where the surname is found. The country that stands out the most is
Italy as
it is the one place where both the surname is known to occur *and* J2a1b is
concentrated -- not just found, but concentrated. J2a1b occurs in Spain and
Portugal, but is not common there. If you were playing the odds, you'd have
to
bet on Italy.
I'm very much encouraged that a renewed effort is being made to uncover more
documents in Maryland, yet I believe ultimately the only way we are going to
discover Peter's origin is through DNA testing. But even if we find paper
documentation, I would still want DNA confirmation.
I and some interested parties have been working behind the scenes to
encourage
some foreign-born CARRICOs to be tested (in some cases, sons or grandsons of
immigrants). At the moment, we have two offers of free testing on the table
to
several with Italian or Turkish origins. These are people who are not
working
on their genealogy, so have a low incentive to be tested, even when the
testing
is being offered without cost. Wish us luck.
Diana
P.S. For those of you who are interested in finally uncovering your CARRICO
origins, the best thing you can do is 1) get your own CARRICO cousins tested
and
2) donate to the CARRICO General Fund, to give us the means to offer free
testing to more CARRICOs with known foreign origins.
-----Original Message-----
From: carrico-bounces(a)rootsweb.com On Behalf Of Jim Carico
Sent: Monday, June 04, 2007 5:11 PM
To: carrico(a)rootsweb.com
Subject: Re: [CARRICO] Another Look at Origins
Tim, Diana & others,
Your responses to my message have been enlightening to me and
perhaps to others, so I extend my appreciation to you all.
Tim's point is well taken regarding making a distinction between the
and the person. It is possible that Peter was an Englishman, perhaps
for
only a short time, with a non-English-derived name. Is this correct?
Diana's extensive and informative response shows the thoroughness of
analysis leading to her conclusion that the surname is Spanish, Italian,
Portuguese in origin. Her extensive and careful work, as evidenced by
her
census summary, is to be commended. Now I understand the basis for her
enthusiasm for an origin of the name to be from one of these three
countries.
For fun, I will venture a scenario based on these responses and adding a
of conjecture of my own:
-A male Moorish (source of haplotype J2a1b) invader in Italy
(based on a well-known & historical means of genetic dispersal) left his
Y chromosome to a (bastard?) son. Italy is chosen as the most likely
candidate because of the location of the greatest frequency of the
among the three countries, Portugal, Spain, and Italy.
-This son, or later descendent, adopted the surname Carrico
to accommodate
to the Italian language, or because it was the Italian
mother's surname.
-An Italian Carrico male descendent of whatever generation,
named perhaps
Pietro Carrico, migrated to England where he may have learned English.
-In England, leaving no male descendents (or if he did, his
male line died
out), Pietro joined a group of 12 Englishmen who were transported to
Maryland by Samuel Dobson.
-Pietro's given name was anglicized to Peter (mistakenly written as
"Curricoe" by the English functionary who recorded the event)
after landing
in Maryland in 1674.
-Peter Carrico (now using the anglicized given name and the
correct and
current spelling of the surname) entered into service as an indentured
servant whereupon he was eventually awarded 50 acres of land.
-He married an unnamed English (probably) lass and then produced four
children. And the "rest is history" as they say.
Is any of this NOT plausible?
Thanks for the information and time.
Jim
-----Original Message-----
From: carrico-bounces(a)rootsweb.com
[mailto:carrico-bounces@rootsweb.com] On
Behalf Of Diana Gale Matthiesen
Sent: Saturday, June 02, 2007 3:19 PM
To: carrico(a)rootsweb.com
Subject: Re: [CARRICO] Another Look at Origins
Jim,
We do know that Peter was an immigrant. On 15 Jun 1674 in
Charles Co., MD
(Patent Book 18, p. 80), Samuel Dobson came before the court
and petitioned
for
"head-rights" for having transported 13 people to the province. A
"head-right"
meant that anyone bringing in a new colonist (at their
expense) would be
rewarded with 50 acreas of land, so Samuel was requesting 650
acres. One of
those persons was "Peter Curricoe." On 17 Jun 1674, Samuel
was awarded his
land. Peter was then indentured. He served the standard
seven years after
which, in 1781, he was awarded the standard 50 acres of land.
As for changing his name from Pedro or Pero or Piero or
whatever it was,
most
immigrants had their given name, if not their surname,
Anglicized the minute
they stepped off the boat. Being always listed as Peter on
his American
records
does not establish that he was English; it establishes that
the clerks were
English.
As for using English names, such as Maidstone, after arriving
in Maryland,
Peter
did not come to Maryland as a member of a group (of Italians
or Spaniards or
Portuguese or whatever). Unlike, for example, my Pennsylvania Deutsch
ancestors, who came to southeastern PA by the boatload,
settled together,
and
clung to their language and customs for decades (some, to the
present day),
Peter apparently arrived alone. He was an indentured servant
for seven
years,
so he had plenty of time to learn English before gaining his
freedom; and he
would have had to assimilate to the culture around him or remain an
outsider.
As for what the spelling of his name indicates, to me it
shrieks, not so
much
"Romance" languages, which would include French, Romanian,
and some others,
but
most likely Italian, Portuguese or Spanish. You might be
able to make a
case
for CARRICO being British (though I don't see it), but it is
not remotely
Germanic or Scandinavian. My suspicions are supported by the
fact that, in
all
the U.S. censuses, the only foreign-born CARRICOs have this derivation
(Italian,
Portuguese, or Spanish):
http://dgmweb.net/genealogy/Census/Carrico/CarricoCensusSummary.shtml
One way to test the ethnicity of a name is to go to the major online
pedigree
databases and search on the surname. If you do a search on
CARRICO born in
England at WorldConnect, you get ten hits, nine of which
errors (they're of
Peter and his daughter, Jane) and the tenth is in 1889, which, even if
correct,
does not speak to the origin of CARRICO. If I search on CARRICOE or
CURRICOE
born in England, I get no hits, at all. Likewise, Scotland, Ireland,
Sweden,
Norway, Finland, Germany, Belgium, and the Netherlands. If I
search on
France,
all I get is erroneous hits for Peter and his children.
The other database to try is the LDS database, especially as
it includes a
great
many non-U.S. birth records. The difficulty searching there
is that their
kludge of a search engine won't allow you to search on just a
surname if you
include a birthplace, so you have to enter just the surname, then wade
through
all the hits. Doing so for CARRICO gives us one hit for
Guatemala, a bunch
of
erroneous hits for France (of Peter and his children), 13
hits for Mexico;
29
hits for South America (Brazil, Argentina, Bolivia, etc.); 47
for "Southwest
Europe," which includes CARRICO records for Spain, Portugal,
and Italy.
Nothing
for anywhere else.
Then there is the matter of place names. There are three
places in the
world
named Carrica, one each in Spain, Portugal, and Mozambique;
and there are
six
named Carrico, one in Portugal, two in Mozambique, and three
in the U.S. (in
VA
and MD).
Lastly, there is the DNA evidence. We are haplogroup J2a1b.
Please go to
this
page, scroll down to Figure 2, and see the map labeled J-M67,
which is the
distribution of the CARRICO subclade:
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=1181965
The highest concentrations are in Italy and east of the Black
Sea (Turkey,
Armenia, Georgia, and southern Russia). J2a1b is almost
nonexistent in the
British Isles and northern Europe.
I don't think we need to take a step backwards and say we
"haven't a clue"
to
Peter CARRICO's origin. We have the orthography of the name,
the current
distribution of the name, the distribution of placenames, and the
distribution
of the DNA subclade all telling us the most likely origin is Portugal,
Spain, or
Italy. I'll get a big kick out of it being something more
exotic, like
Turkish
or Russian, but that's really less likely (I can't speak for
Turkish or
Armenian
names, but CARRICO is not remotely Slavic). One of the major
reasons to do
DNA
testing is to get you looking in the right places for your
ancestors. I
can't
see, at this point, ignoring what the DNA is telling us by looking
elsewhere.
If we really want to answer the question of our origins, we
need to make it
a
top priority to bring European-born CARRICOs, or American
CARRICOs with a
known
European origin, into the DNA project.
Diana
> -----Original Message-----
> From: carrico-bounces(a)rootsweb.com On Behalf Of Jim Carico
> Sent: Saturday, June 02, 2007 12:57 PM
> To: carrico(a)rootsweb.com
> Subject: [CARRICO] Another Look at Origins
>
> In the discussion during the last few days, I am troubled by the
widely-held
> assumption that the origin of the Carrico surname must be
found among the
> Romance language speakers of Southern Europe, particularly, the
Portuguese.
> Below, I would offer some contravening arguments in favor
of a northern,
> particularly Anglo, origin instead.
>
> First, consider details of the name of the "first" known
North American
> Carrico/Carico, Peter Carricoe (do we have proof he was the
"immigrant"?).
> It seems to me that we have overlooked some obvious clues
here that would
be
> of help.
> Let's dissect the name.
> 1. "Peter" is not a common given name in Southern Europe,
but is common
> in Northern Europe and in Britain. Are we assuming that the
> Spanish/Portuguese/Italian immigrant changed his name from
"Pedro/Pietro"
to
> the English equivalent, "Peter" when he stepped ashore?
> 2. It seems that we have focused on a Southern European
origin partly
> because of that terminal vowel sound, "oh", because it is
so common there.
> Peter's surname with a terminal "e" after the last syllable
with an "oh"
> sound is not common in Southern Europe, but is found in
English names with
a
> terminal "oh" sound, e.g., Bledsoe, Steptoe, Monroe.
> Further, consider other English surnames with that "oh"
sound such as:
Barlow,
> Bristowe, etc.
> 3. How about the double "rr" in the name? Look at some British (I
> assume) surnames with this combination of consonants:
Barrow, Burrow,
> Barrett (or Barrette), Barr, Currier, Harris, etc. Those of us who
> struggled to pronounce "burrito" correctly, may tend to
associate this
> combination of consonants mostly with a southern European
> language. But why bother with wrestling with trills and
other features of
the
> double "rr" as it is pronounced in Southern Europe when we
have a source
of
> the double "rr" spelling in Northern Europe? And regarding the
pronunciation,
haven't we
> heard bit of a trill in the speech of native Scots and Irish, e.g.,
> Edinburgh, Londonderry? We need look no further than when
considering
> pronunciations in problems with transcriptions and record keeping.
>
> What about the country of origin? It follows that as we
concentrate on
> Southern Europe as a source of the surname because of its current
> pronunciation, we are obliged to look there for the origin of the
immigrant.
> But if we relieve ourselves of these assumptions, then we
can be free to
> look elsewhere. Consider the following argument: Probably
in those early
> years immigrants to the middle Atlantic coast were from
English-speaking
> countries, and so the weight of numbers is in favor of the
latter for a
> source of our first Carricoe. Additionally, a perusal of
early given names
> in our Carrico/Carico genealogies and names of their estates, e.g.,
> "Maidstone," are all English names. Even today, new
immigrants tend to
use
> names formed from the language of the "old country" for at least one
> generation.
>
> Therefore, given the above assumptions, we need to apply the fewest
> contortions to derive the first known Carricoe from an
English-speaking
> country rather than from Southern Europe. My main purpose in this
discourse
> is to encourage researchers to pursue a wider range of
possibilities for
the
> origin of our first Carricoe; it is not my intention to
prove that the
name
> is English or any other derivation because I have no proof
to offer...yet.
>
> Jim
>
>
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