Ella, Thanks for that background. I had heard something about the name Maria but could not remember the detail! In many of my 1800s records Mariannas turn into Marias over time - although I have to confess that these are Evangelical rather than Roman Catholic records. Maybe a similar idea applied to both? Bronwyn. On Tue, Feb 1, 2011 at 1:58 PM, singmore <[email protected]> wrote: > Adding to Roman's excellent explanation. Marianna (female name) was > extremely popular in pre-WWI Poland due to the fact that the church frowned > on anybody who wanted to name their girl Maria. Reasoning being that Maria > was the name of the Mother of God and no mortal being should bear that name. > So people would put Marianna (as sounding somewhat similar) on the church > record but use Maria at home anyway. And while the name Maria has been since > de-throned (so to speak) and has been widely used, you will not find a Pole > named Jesus (as opposed to Italy and Spain for example). > > Ella > > -----Original Message----- > From: [email protected] [mailto: > [email protected]] On Behalf Of Roman > Sent: Monday, January 31, 2011 5:19 PM > To: [email protected] > Subject: Re: [POLAND] The names Marian and Marianna > > Lindy asked that I clarify a few items... and it may be a wise thing to > do here since one can easily get confused with these names. > > With regard to origins... > > Marian (male) and Marianna (female, also Mariana) have Latin origins and > designate someone belonging to Mariusz or that family or to Mars (the > Roman god of War). The Latin form for Mariusz is Marius (as in Gajus > Marius). > > In particular, these names are not Polish equivalents of the English > name Maryann, a combinational form of Mary Ann, nor do they originate > from the name Mary (which has Hebrew origins). > > With regard to grammar... > > The Polish Masculine Genitive Singular case endings are -a and -u. A > noun stem ending in -n will almost always form the genitive case by > attaching the ending -a. This means that the Genitive Case for the male > name Marian is Mariana (not Marianna). > > The Female Genitive Case of Marianna is Marianny. > > Hope this helps a bit. > > Roman >