For all on the Madeira List, especially Pat Corbera Silva and Sue Muscate -- Sue mentioned in a recent e-mail message to me her desire to put together a history of the Jardim roots on Madeira, for her next family reunion. I've been digging at the roots, too, but have lately decided that they're lost to history. One thing is certain: the name arose on Madeira as a toponym, a place name, of uncertain beginnings, as Luis de Sousa Mello suggested to my sister when she talked with him in Funchal some years ago. This seems to be the view as well of Paulo Gomes Jardim, and my research leans that way, too. My own guess is that somebody named Rodrigues, or perhaps Goncalves, or whoever, settled in the Calheta area fairly early on, one of the many continental opportunists looking to tap into the bustling sugar enterprise, and in the process he reinvented himself - Madeira was that kind of place. As so-and-so from such-and-such place, he eventually saw the "do Jardim" appellation subsuming his proper surname. I sense a Jardim connection with Estreito da Calheta and its prominent de França (another reinvention) family (of Polish-French origin) as perhaps most significant as catalyst. A helpful source is Antroponímia primitiva da Madeira e Reportório onomàstico histórico da Madeira (séculos XV e XVI), published in 1999 by a German firm, Tubingen. It lists the early Madeira names and touches on other historical matters as well - where the settlers came from (an old point of contention), names and how they became modified, designations for slaves and other imported labor, etc. It will not be easy to find -- I consulted the volume at the New York Public Library. The chief author is Naidea Nunes Nunes.