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[Facts] Rosme
Browsing cemetery records in South Africa, as one does, I found a reference to one Rosme Curtis, an English-speaking woman, born in 1907. Has anyone encountered Rosme before? It's new to me, and though I have my theories (Esme plus Rose, basically) I've got no facts at all.
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She's the only one ever born in the UK. In the birth register for 1907 she's down as 'Rosmè', which looks vaguely Italian to me, and a quick Google shows a few Italian entries which all seem to be using it as a short form of Rosemary / Rosmerta / some other Ros-name. So, an Italian connection somewhere, maybe?Facebook has over 400 Rosmes, sans accent and mostly South American. I did find another Rosmè -in SA. A relative, maybe?

This message was edited 5/18/2010, 11:12 AM

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That might cause a rethink. Thanks, Pie! South Africans often enjoy blended names, some of them rather odd, and since I only had the lady's death and not her place of birth I'd assumed she was a local. In which case Rose + Esme would have been top of the list. But her Italian connection - well, Mediterranean I suppose given the South Americans - opens up new avenues.For some reason, South African census records are destroyed as soon as the number crunchers are finished with them, and it's no end of a mission to get BMD stats here, so this had better be put on ice until retirement!
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The South Americans are possibly a false trail, as they're all about the blended names too. I'll pm you the birth reference.
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Sounds like a short form like Rosmi, which is short for Rosmitah or Rosminah (at least 1 person uses the name Rosme as a short form for Rosmitah). Also found the name Rosmel (no meaning found). In Arabian Rosminah رسمناه means "We have set" (online translation, so maybe not reliable)I found the name Rosmita in be in use in Indonesia and India. Perhaps Rosmita has a connection with the name Mita, meaning: "Fixed, Grounded". The origin of the name Mita is Indian (Sanskrit) (http://www.babynames.com/name/MITA)
According to other sources Mita means "Friend" (http://babynamesworld.parentsconnect.com/meaning_of_Mita.html)
There is also a name Mita in Italian, meaning "Myth" (from Italian mito).
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Though the roo mi in sanskrit does mean to fix or establish, the word mita in that sense is rarely recognized today: the masculine form was indeed used as a name in the ancient times, but I do not think the modern feminine mitA derives from that. Certainly, the name is usually interpreted as a NIA word which originates in the sanskrit mitra, a friend, probably connected with mith, to unite.I do not know about Rosmita, but would guess it is a made up form patterned after names ending in smitA, smiling, from the root smi cognate with and meaning smile, or to blush; it may also be influenced by rashmi, an old word originally meaning rope, but the persistent metaphorical use of ropes of light have pulled a lot of rope words into ray words in Sanskrit, and the ray of light is the only surviving meaning of rashmi. Of course, it could also be a semitic word borrowed in since the sound structure is very familiar.
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