Family History
Charles Marfe
Do you have roots in Genoa? A Letter to the Editor from Charles Marfe.
I
have been an avid reader of your publication for some years now. Either my wife or I pick up a copy as soon as it comes out. I was very interested in Kenneth Sciacaluga’s article in your May issue on tracing our ancestry. I have always been keen to trace my ancestors and like most Gibraltarians, I sought the help
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of Louis Pereira some years ago who was able, with the help of the Cathedral of St Mary the Crowned records,to go back to the early 1800’s when my great, great, great grandfather came over, with his wife, from a little town called Noli with under 3,000 inhabitants in the region of Liguria in province Savona near Genoa, Italy
to settle in Gibraltar. Between 1802 and 1816 they had six children all of whom were baptised in the Cathedral in Gibraltar. Then followed five more generations including my son, all born in Gibraltar and baptised in the same Cathedral. This was all very well but I now wanted to go back to before the move to Gibraltar. How far back could we go in Noli tracing the MARFEline? This was when I e-mailed Emilio Rombo an archivist in Genoa, as suggested by your article, to see whether he could help me. Emilio does not speak a word of English and I do not speak Italian but thanks to google translation we got on. The gentleman could not have been more helpful. I sent him all the records I had and within
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the space of very little time he had found no less than four more generations going back to 1667. All baptised and married in the same Cathedral in Noli. Naturally there have been variations in the name and among all the transcripts of the records found in both Churches, we come across spellings like MAFFEI, MAFE,MAFFE and MAFEE. I suggest that if anyone is interested in tracing their Genoese ancestors, Emilio is your man. He can be contacted at Via Cerruti 15/17, 16154 Genova Italy or by email atemilio.rombo@gmail.com Now all I need to do is visit the Cathedral of San Pietro in Noli. Yours sincerely, Charles Marfe