What's in a name?

June 6, 2011

The past couple of weeks I have stumbled across some interesting pieces of the puzzle that is me. I suppose it started when my mother sent me our family tree. Learning that my maternal great great great great great great grandfather might have been sent as a convict to Australia in the 1800's filled me with a new sense of questioning of my identity. It was also really interesting to learn my very great grandfather's name - Joseph Jay. My brother's name is Jay, which was chosen for completely unrelated reasons but the link is uncanny. Piquing my interest, I started thinking about my own name and it's history. Growing up, I had always wanted to find my name on a keyring at a tourist shop. There were always plenty of Amanda's and Louise's but never a Cézanne in sight. And I was sure that my name had to be something more special that plain old Suzanne or Susan, as so many people had decidedly told me. Today I discovered my name history. My FIRST name, Cézanne, comes from the last name of the French, Post-Impressionist Artist "Paul Cézanne". He too was a Capricorn, born on January 19, however some 142 years before I arrived. Although he was born in Provence in France, originally his family "The Cézanne's" came from a small town on the border of France and Italy - Cesana Torinese. "The Cézannes came from the small town of Cesana now in West Piedmont, and it has been assumed that their name came from Italian origin." -  http://www.comune.cesana.to.it

My LAST name, Nataly, also has an interesting background. My paternal grandfather was born in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. This province in South Africa was colonised by the British in 1843. Invading the land that was of the African people, the British set up a sugar cane industry in the 1860s. But the farm owners had a difficult time attracting Zulu labourers to work on their plantations, for obvious reasons. So instead the cunning Brits imported workers from another of their colonies. India.  Thousands and thousands of labourers arrived  from India and as a result, South Africa became the home to a large Indian population. My very great grandfather on my dad's side was the son of an Indian labourer in South Africa. Eventually, after a feud between him and his brother, my very great grandfather localised his name to Nataly - the brother from the Province of Natal.

So where does that leave me? An Australian, British, Indian, Fijian, South African with a French name...living in Italy.