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Guild of One-Name Studies

One-name studies, Genealogy

Is your surname here?

    • 2,223 members
    • 2,138 studies
    • 7,589 surnames

Orlando One-Name Study

Page Views: 1,880

Study details

Study: Orlando   

Variants: Orlanda, Orlande

Category:  1 - A study where research using core genealogical datasets and transcriptions is in its early stages.

Guild hosted website: orlando.one-name.net

DNA website: www.familytreedna.com/public/orlando/

Contact: Mrs Julie Goucher


About the study

My name is Julie Goucher and I began researching my family history in 1986. My maternal line focuses on the English Counties of Surrey, Sussex and Hampshire with a further line in Warwickshire, although there have been branches of the families migrating to Australia, Canada and having links with India. I began researching my husband's ancestors in 1993.
 
The One Name Study for the name of ORLANDO,which is registered with the Guild of One Name Studies, commenced in February 2002, focusing on my paternal Italian Ancestry, by the time I had finally decided to register the One Name Study I had been researching my family history for 16 years and had been collecting Orlando references since the late 1980's.
 

The name ORLANDO is an Italian name, with my own research focusing on Sicily, but nevertheless, material about the origins of the name, is short supply and is linked to the name of Roland. Details about this part of the study appear elsewhere, except to say try putting the name ORLANDO into a search engine, I used Google, and once you have discarded the many sites about a holiday in Orlando Florida, there are some interesting sites and further lines of enquiry.

One of the initial things that made me decide to research the name more fully was stumbling across a marriage reference in Woking Surrey England in 1901 of an Orlando, nothing odd in that, except that my own branch of the Orlando's did not arrive in the area until sixty years later, or did they? Every study has a catalyst and this was mine.

Linked with the Orlando One Name Study is the Sutera One Place Study which is the commune in Sicily that my own family hails from.

Earlier in 2017 I submitted the study to the Members Website Project, which is a benefit of Guild membership. The website can be found HERE and I am gradually adding to the database and uploading all the material I have collated over the years. 

I also created a newsletter called Orlando News which is available to download or read via the Orlando website and a copy of each edition is also lodged with the British Library and the Guild library. There is also a Facebook group, which I am hoping will grow and develop over time and a DNA project.

In recent years there have been a number of articles & blog posts published about the Orlando One-Name Study. In addition I have also given several presentations about the Study.

  • March 2015 - Origins & Evolution of a One-Name or Surname Study - Southern California Genealogical Society (SCGS) Webinar series.
  • February 2017 - Orlando DNA Project - Family Tree Magazine (UK)
  • October 2017  - Setting up a One-Name Study which features the Orlando study - Family Tree Magazine (UK)
  • October 2017 - Pathway to My Sicilian Heritage - Legacy Family Tree Blog
  • October 2017 - Starting Your Italian Research Journey - Legacy Family Tree Blog
  • November 2017 I decided to rework the March 2015 presentation, the Origins and Evolution of a One-Name Study for the Guild and a copy of the presentation sits on the main website, but as it is about the Orlando study it would be quite wrong to not have a copy of it here. A syllabus has been written to accompany the presentation and that can be downloaded HERE

  • January 2018 - From a Single Name – Beginnings of an Italian One-Name Study ~ Journal of One-Name Studies, Vol 13, Issue 1, pp 30-32 ~ Jan-March 2018, for which I was awarded the Guild Award of Excellence.
  • August 2018 - My Italian Surname Study ~ Guild of One-Name Studies 7 Pillars Webinar Series, joint presentation with Michael Cassara of the Cuono One-Name Study

Variant names

Varients included with this study are ORLANDA, ORLANDE.

Historical occurrences of the name

There are a number of historical or famous occurrences of the surname Orlando, below are just a few:

  • Vittorio Emanuele Orlando (1860-1952) - former Prime Minister of Italy
  •  

Name frequency

The biggest instances of the Surname can be found in Italy and outside of Italy in the United States. There are Orlando's across the globe and collating the data is going to be a lifetime's work and will almost certainly outlive me!
 
There have been instances of the surname within the British Isles since the early 1800's and in some cases they were merely passing through, using the British Isles as a stepping stone to pastures new, probably the United States.
 
A search of Surname Atlas, which is published by Steve Archer reveals one instance of the name of Orlando in 1881 Census. On checking the original Census the Orlando references was enumerated incorrectly and the surname was Deslandes, a well known and respected ship building family from Jersey in the Channel Islands.

Distribution of the name

I am very interested in seeing how the distribution of the surname appears across a variety of Countries.
 
This map from Surname Profiler shows the distribution across the globe, with the most instances of the surname occurring outside of Italy in Argentina and the United States.
 
 
Distribution of the Orlando name in Italy from THIS website

Distribution of the Orlando Surname in Italy
Distribution of the Orlando name the USA (below) from THIS website
Distribution of the Surname of Orlando in the USA
 
Given the peaks of migration from Italy, in particular the south of the mainland and Sicily I have always been interested in the distribution of the surname across the United States and the reasoning for certain states to be more prevalent to Italian migration over another.
 
The image below is from Ancestry and shows the surname distribution across the United States in 1880
 
 
You can also see a visual of the distribution of the surname across the United States in 1920.
 
 

Data

Material indexed in the study depends on the locality of the record.
* Birth & Baptisms
* Marriage index
* Deaths & Burials
* Probate & Wills
* Obituaries
* Monumental Inscriptions
* Military Records
* Trade Directories
* Census Material  (UK) ~ {1841} {1851} {1861} {1871} {1881} {1891} {1901} {1911}
* Census Material (Other Nations)
* Newspapers Articles
* Photographic Material
* Biographies
* Family Groups
* Miscellaneous records
* Scrapbook ~ Non Specific Information for the name of Orlando
* Overseas Material
* Passenger Lists
* Orlando One Name Study Bibliography
* Orlando News (ISSN 2053 8987)
 
As well as details on the surname, I am also collating details of different Orlando's - Such as Orlando Cherry Brandy (I have a rather large collection of the china urns!) and H M S Orlando.
 
 
The Orlando Study is very much a continuing work in progress and welcomes contact from those interested in the surname anywhere and any additions to the study.

DNA

The Orlando DNA Project formed on 11th November 2007.  
There is a DNA study website located at http://www.familytreedna.com/public/Orlando/
 
We are actively looking for people to contribute to the study.

Links

  • Orlando Website - under construction!
  • The Orlando ONS blog 
  • The Orlando Facebook group

 

  • The Anglo Italian FHS 
  • Sutera is also registered with The Register of One-Place Studies 
 
Orlando Profile updated 10 November 2021

Contact Details

Mrs Julie Goucher

General Search Results

Occurrences of the surname Orlando in the Guild Indexes
(Click on the number to view the search results in each index. Indexes marked by * are only accessible by logged in Guild members.)
  • Global Marriages (public)  28
  • Global Marriages (members)* 29
  • Datastores  645
  • Study materials for the study Orlando* 4
  • References to the name Orlando in the Guild Journal  4

Other Guild Websites

You may find our other Guild websites of interest:

  • Members’ Websites Program
  • Surname Cloud
  • Guild Members’ records on FamilySearch
  • Guild Marriage Locator

Contact Us

Email: Guild General Contact
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Kent, CT6 8FE. UK.
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