Recorded as Gremane, Gremain, and originally (in England) Gremani, this is a surname of uncertain origins. It is apparently very rare, and we were fortunate in finding a recording in the International Genealogical Index of what would seem to be an Italian called William Gremani and his wife Elizabeth at St Pancras Old Church, in the city of London. This recording was on October 20th 1791 when a daughter called Belina Rosetta Gremani was christened at the church. This lead us to a later recording at the church of St Ann's Soho, Westminster, when on June 30th 1799, Ann Catharine Parbridge Gremane, the daughter of William Germane and his wife Elizabeth was christened. It would therefore seem that during that decade Willam and his wife 'lost' the Italian appearance of the name, possibly for reason of political correctness, but poor spelling is as likely!.These changes all took place during the Napoleonic Wars of 1794 - 1815, when to have a 'foreign' name in London was not advised.The surname later changed again to Gremain, but we do not have an accurate date for this. A problem in deciding the meaning is that the name as Gremani does not appear in the Italian lists. An examination of available recordings would suggest that the name was originally Germani or Germano, meaning 'The German', and somehow in its journey to England, the spelling became transposed, for the first but not the last time.

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