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Archiver > AZORES > 1999-09 > 0936807629


From: "Mike and Beth" <>
Subject: [AZORES-L] Fw: Interesting Pereira information
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 1999 09:20:29 -0700


Hi Doug,

You made the following comment in your reply to me yesterday:

>One comment I have is that first mentions the origin of the name Pereira,
>then tries to lead into this person's ancestry as if it was the same noble
>line of Pereira previously described, but it can't be since he was a Jew
>and just adopted it as a name.

This perplexed me also, so I emailed Dr. Gomez and asked about this. He
replied this morning, and clarified things:

According to Dr. Ruth Gomez Schirmacher, the Hispanic Specialist at the Salt
Lake City Family Library, the Spanish and Portuguese Dictionary says that
the Pereira/Pereyra noble line is originally from Galicia, and can be
traced back to the 1100's. From Galicia they went to Portugal, then to
Spain and the Americas. The Pereiras from the XII Century, are from the
House of Trastamara in Traba, Galicia. From there they went to Oporto, to a
place called Quinta Pereira----this is where they took the name. Ruy
Gonzalez de Pereira, son of one of the Counts of Trastamara, who moved to
Portugal in the 12th Century, was the first to take the name Pereira. I
know you know all this---just showing you that this is understood.

The Sephardim Pereiras are indeed from a different line. According to Dr.
Jaime Gomez, the book, Noble Families Among Sephardite Jews by Isaac
D'Costa, Oxford, 1936 states that the Abendanas family of Sephardic Jews
took the name Pereira upon their conversion at the turn of the XV Century.

I hope this clears things up somewhat. I will post this to both lists.

Kind regards,
Bet

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