Anthony Adolph, Nov 2013

I am working on a project to trace the origins of the Privilegio family.

The surname can also be spelled Privileggio, Privilagio, Privelagio (etc.), and presumably denotes the recipient of some sort of privilege. It is an Italian surname but is found in reasonable numbers in the Greek islands and in the eastern Mediterranean generally, suggesting either that the family had been there for some centuries. The family were Catholics, thus harking back to their Italian roots.

We think that this line might go back to Gianuli Privilegio who came from Syros. We know he had a daughter Agnes Privilegio, who married on 22 July 1742 on Syros to Georges Brindisi - view chart. Gianuli may also have been father of Jean Privileggio who married Maria Steffano from Syros in February 1815 at the Catholic church of SS Pierre and Paul in Constantinople. In January 1822, a Mr Crespin requested permission from the British Consulate General in Constantinople for his son to marry Cecile, the daughter of a broker called Jean Privileggio, a Catholic ‘from islands’ that were then under British protection: he did not say which one, but it may well have been Syros.

Later, we encounter three Privilegios, perhaps all siblings of each other:

1. Michele Privilegio (see below)
2. Nicholas Privilegio, godfather to Anna and John, the children of Michael. He may be identical with the N. Privilegio who was listed in 1840 as a registered trader in the Galata Stock Market, and was listed in a Constantinople directory of 1868/9 as ‘N. Privileggio; Billour 7, Galata (Negociant)’.
3. Eleanora Privilegio. She was godmother to Michele Privilegio’s son John in 1856. She may have married John Fisher, an Englishman in Smyrna, and they had children baptised at Bornova, Smyrna.

Michele Privilegio

His occupation is unknown, and he is first heard of in Constantinople, where his son was baptised in 1856. At that point he was described as being ‘of Syra’. He married Vittoria Attard. Michele and Vittoria had children baptised in Constantinople as follows:

1. Anna Privilegio, born on 21 April and baptised on 29 July 1862 at St Antoine’s Catholic Church, Constantinople, with godparents Nicholas Privilegio and Regina Cavegeoglu.
2. John Privilegio. He was born on 1 July and baptised on 20 July 1856 at St Antoine, Constaninople, with godparents Nicholas and Eleanora Privilegio. A note under his baptism entry tells us that he married on 22 April 1913 at St Spiritus, Constantinople, to Eugene Lucia, daughter of Stephen Tossignani. He may be the J. Privilegio who appears in an 1888 Constantinople directory as ‘employé a la Régie des tabacs’, (the Regie Co Intéressée des Tabacs de L’empire Otoman beingat Tidjaret Han, Perchembé Bazar, Galata).
3. Giuseppe Privilegio (see below)

Giuseppe Privilegio

Giuseppe is Joseph in English. He was born on 21 July 1859 and baptised on 8 September 1859 at St Antoine’s Catholic Church, Constantinople, with godparents Jean Baptiste Attard and Annetta Attard, who were no doubt close relations of his mother’s.

Giuseppe left Constantinople, sailing through the Hellespont into the Mediterranean and then down the Anatolian coast as far as Smyrna (modern Izmir), where he settled.

Giuseppe was described as not being resident of Bornova, the part of Smyrna mainly inhabited by ‘Franks’ (western Europeans), in 1891, but nor was his bride, despite her having been baptised there, so maybe this means they were living elsewhere in Smyrna at the time.

Giuseppe married on Tuesday 29 December 1891 at the church of St Maria Guatiarum in Bornova (marriage register vol. 2, no. 42), before witnesses Alessandro Segro, Michele Depella and Carlo Mühleberger, by assistant priest P. Pacifico da Collepardo, O.F.M. His bride was Maria Francoise Privilegio, described herself as not resident in Bornova at the time, daughter of Andre Privilegio, whose pedigree is given separately below. Maria Francoise was born on Sunday 8 September 1871 and baptised on Sunday 7 October 1872 (sic) at St Maria Guariarum, Bornova, Smyrna (vol. 1, no. 883). Her godfather was recorded as Bartolomeo Campi, and the priest was P. Americao da Collepetro.

Giuseppe is said to have been a merchant and theatre-owner. He may have owned the very theatre described at the very beginning of Stefanos Xenos’s novel The Devil in Turkey (1851):

The clock of the small theatre at Smyrna, designated by the name of Euterpe, had chimed the half hour after eleven, when, at the conclusion of the opera, the company who had flocked to witness the performance, were seen issuing from the door in one continuous stream. The night was intensely dark; - the rain poured in torrents, and the streets of the city being unprovided with trottoirs for the accommodation of foot-passengers, were rendered almost impassable in the dark, for the accumulation of mud, and the pools of water which lodged in various places where the rough and irregular stones that formed the pavement had either sunk into the ground, or disappeared.

Giuseppe and Maria had children:

1. Celestine Privilegio, born about 1898 in Smyrna, the wife of Ioannis Galani of Constantinople.
2. A daughter who died young
3. A daughter who lived in Marseilles, married a historian who spoke Latin and ancient Greek (after a stroke he forgot his French but not Latin): they had no children.
4. A daughter who lived in Cannes, and married to Mr Jardin: soon after they married, he joined up as an officer and fought in the First World War, and was gassed: he survived and became a PTT director, but died in a car accident after the Second World War: they had an only child:
   1. Inette Fardin, who died of food poisoning, having eating oysters in Marseilles at the age of 18.
5. Lisa Privilegio. She married Henri Quadan or Cuadan, from Puy-de-Dôme, who had a castle at La Pallice.

At some point, the Privilegios fled away from Smyrna. This may have been due to the outbreak of the First World War – it is not clear. They went by ship to the south of France, landing in Marseilles, which is why two of the daughters married Frenchmen. Then, the family settled in Constantinople, presumably because this is where the family came from. Between 1919 and 1923, Constantinople was under Allied occupation, and this may have encouraged them to return.

Giuseppe Privilegio died in Constantinople in 1932. His widow Maria Privilegio later followed her daughter to Athens, and then to Paris, and died there in 1965, aged 85.

This section concerns the ancestry of Maria Francoise Privilegio, who married Giuseppe Privilegio, above. Her line of ancestry has been traced as follows:

Georges Privilegio

He may have come from Syros or Constantinople, or he may himself have been a native of Smyrna. He married Anne Badetti.

The Badetti family appear in a list made by l'Abbé de Burgo of Smyrna families of Genoese origin.

Georges and Anna Privilegio had children including:

Andre Privilegio.

He was born in or about 1846. He married on 19 August 1871 at St Maria Guatiarum, Bornova, Smyrna, to Antonia Caparini. Antonia was the daughter of Aloysius Caparini and Maria Armao. Andre died on 6 July 1891, aged 45, and was buried at Burnabat.

This couple had children baptised in Smyrna, as follows:

1. Maria Francoise Privilegio, who married Giuseppe Privilegio (see above).
2. Eugenia Privilegio, born on 18 December 1873 and baptised on 11 January 1874 at St Maria Guariarum, Bornova, Smyrna.
3. Anna Joseph Privilegio, born on 7 March 1878 and baptised on 19 March that year at St Maria Guariarum, Bornova, Smyrna. She married Mario Stephano, son of Giovanni Stephano and Sofia Luvari on 6 December 1911 at St Elena, Smyrna.
4. Irene Privilegio, born on Saturday 28 February 1880 and baptised on Monday 5 April 1880 at St Maria Guariarum, Bornova, Smyrna.
5. Caterina Privilegio, born on 4 July 1882 and baptised on 31 August 1882 at St Maria Guariarum, Bornova, Smyrna.
6. Giovanni Privilegio, born on 29 June 1884 and baptised on 25 September 1884 at St Maria Guariarum, Bornova, Smyrna.
7. Francesco Privilegio, born on 28 July 1886 and baptised on 25 September 1886 at St Maria Guariarum, Bornova, Smyrna.
8. Elisabetha Privilegio, born on 20 July 1889 and baptised on 12 September 1889 at St Maria Guariarum, Bornova, Smyrna.

Written with many thanks to those who have helped so far, including Craig Encer and Marie-Sylvie Lhomer.

Anthony ADOLPH (www.anthonyadolph.co.uk) is a professional genealogist, writer and broadcaster in Britain, who specialises in families with a British ancestry but who has also worked over the years on several detailed family histories in Greece and Turkey. He would be delighted to hear from anyone who knows more about the Privilegio families mentioned in this article.

 Notes: Additional information provided by contributors: Alex Baltazzi
Timoleontos D. Abela in his Istoria tis Nissos Syrou mentions that since 1207 many Latin families were established in the Cyclades. Wıthout beıng possıble to determıne a precise date for them it seems likely the Provilegii family were one of the same.
Olıver Jens Schmitt ın hıs book Les Levantıns mention the Privieggio amongst the Levantine families of Galata-Pera in 1750 and indicate them as having emigrated from Syra. Schmitt also mentions N. Privileggio amongst the levantine trade companies of Galata-Pera for the year 1868.
In the Indicateur commercial of 1898-99 pour Smyrne amongst the Pharmacıes listed (page 206) Privileggio Costi, L’etoile d’or et empailleur d’oiseaux - Rue Franque no 104.
Information courtesy of George Poulimenos
Gianuli Privileggio couldn’t have been the father of both Agnes and Jean, since one was married in 1742 and the other in 1815.
The name Gianuli suggests he was Hellenized. If he weren’t, he would be called Giovanni or Jean. Gianuli means ‘little Jean’ in Greek. We arrive to the same result from the name Costi Privileggio, the Smyrna pharmacist mentionede by Alex. This Costi Privileggio kept or sold stuffed birds in his pharmacy at Rue Franque, according to Prokopiou:
“I see in the shop windows of Costas Privileggios
stuffed partridges, canaries, goldfinches,
lovebirds and so on, standing vividly,
Costas know how to make the dead seem alive.”
There is also a famous Greek poet, writer and politician named Aristomenis Provelengios, born 1850 in Sifnos in the Cyclades (died 1936), who was very probably a member of the same family.
Also, Jean Privileggio, a Catholic ‘from the islands’, then (1822) under British protection, could not have been from the Cyclades. Syros, Tinos and the other islands in the Cyclades were then taking part in the Greek Revolution, they were not British. Instead, Privileggio may have come from the Ionian islands (Corfu etc.) which were under British protection from 1814 to 1864.