Re: QUATTROMANI CONNECTION

["John S. Quarterman" <jsq@matrix.net>]

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Robin,

>So there is a place in Italy called Quattromani? That's very interesting.

Could be.  I don't know anything more about it than what was in that web page.

>No, i do not live in Southern Italy Victoria. I wish i did!
>I actually live in Manchester.
>
>However, my Sister lives in Milan. She works for EMI there and first brought 
>my attention to the Quattromani connection. For even though her surname was 
>slightly different, Italians recognised it!!

Very interesting.

>Initially as a well known family that resided in Palermo, Sicily.This family 
>are reputed to be all brown haired with blue eyes! So very distinctive for 
>Sicily.
>Most Italians who know the name are also aware that they are a NORMAN 
>family, as opposed to French, even today.

Sounds right.

>The fact of the Italian Normans being used in the invasion of England is 
>chronicled in one of John Julius Norwich's books about the Normans. The 
>boats that were used were of a special design that could carry heavy cargo 
>such as Horses, and were based on the ones used in Robert Guiscard's 
invasion of Sicily some years before.
>
>My sister however cannot find any history or background info on this family 
>in Italy. It is strange that this name pops up in various locations around 
>Europe and no one knows anything about them or their origins!
>Although my Sister thinks personally that the family is descended from some 
>sort of infamously ferocious order of knights who were bodyguards employed 
>by the Church.
>
>I have read a number of references to the name QUATREMAYNE which do state 
>that the name is more descriptive in the active sense and not only about 
>'mail-fisted'. That is, the name signifies aggression and agility in combat.
>(Maybe they fought with two swords, Saracen fashion!)

Another obvious possibility is that the four hands refer to manual
dexterity and technical agility, at which at least the U.S. Quartermans
excel to this day.

>The name in this context does sound like the sort of thing connected with 
>the Norman Robert Guiscard, who conquered Southern Italy. He was, by all 
>accounts a ruthless, aggressive but clever person who used the Saracen's 
>(then occupying Sicily) own techniques of fighting to defeat them.
>
>Lastly, and most mysteriously, i have a vague memory of an article in a 
>newspaper that i saw as a child. Though i have to say it is very likely to 
>be completely inaccurate and probably half imagined.But the idea still 
>persists even though no one else in my family really remembers it!
>It was an article about the surname Quarterman and its origins. It said, as 
>i remember it, all the usual things but with one odd exception.
>That of some sort of connection with a Norse? legend of a sea monster!

The basic Norse sea monster was the kraken, probably a giant squid,
which was in the myths so big it was often mistaken for an island:
 http://members.aol.com/Poseidon58/seamonsters.html
 http://unmuseum.mus.pa.us/kraken.htm

>Many many years later i happend to be in a bookshop thumbing through a book 
>about the French naval air arm (Aeronavale) when i spotted the insigia of 
>one of the squadrons, based in the NORTH of France.
>It was a sea monster or Kraken called a MOLOCH?
>It only had FOUR tenticles, could it be the same monster that i think i 
>recall?
>I have to say it's pretty odd, and i cannot confirm it. It may just be  a 
>trick played by the memory and nothing more.

Moloch was not Norse nor French nor a sea monster, rather an apellation
of a Canaanite god, probably Baal:
 http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/10443b.htm

The Aeronavale certainly exists.  One of its squadrons could have been
named anything it liked.  Not sure what that has to do with us.

>That's given you something to chew on!!!!!
>
>Bye,Robin.

John
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