Name Origins
by Julie Helen Otto
CLEMENTINA (f): Derived from the Latin clemens ("mild,
merciful") with addition of productive suffix -ina to the
adjective root, this name has long been used in England. In the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries, the female name had strong Jacobite connotations; one of
the fabled romantic stories of that era was the journey in 1717/18, across much
of Europe, of [Maria Casimire] Clementina Sobieska (d. 1735), Princess
of Poland, to meet and marry James Francis Edward Stuart (1688-1736, the
Jacobite "James III"). Her namesake, Clementina Maria Sophia
Walkinshaw (ca. 1720-1802), mistress of their son "Bonnie Prince
Charlie" (Prince Charles Edward Stuart, 1720-1788, the Jacobite
"Charles III"), bore him several children. After the mid-1750s,
however, and the appearance of Samuel Richardson's Sir Charles Grandison (1753/4) - one of whose two heroines is the noble Italian Clementina
della Porretta - the name was favored by readers across
the political spectrum. Clementine was a variant form which
gained great currency in the mid-nineteenth century with the popular song
"Oh, My Darling Clementine," which requires no previous knowledge of
Richardson.
Clementina Janes (b. 1802), daughter of Peleg Cheney and
Patty (Coy) Janes of Brimfield, Mass., m. there 1 Jan. 1828 Edward Parsons of
Northampton, Mass. (Brimfield VRs, p. 207).Clementina (Ballou) Wright (1812-post
1888, daughter of Rev. Hosea and Ruth [Washburn] Ballou) had no issue by her
marriage to Col. Isaac Hall Wright, but namesakes included nieces (both b.
1834) Clementina (Ballou) Mason (daughter of Rev. Hosea Faxon
and Mary [Ballou] Ballou) and Clementina Clarissa (Ballou) Tucker (daughter
of Rev. Massena Berthier and Mary Sheffield [Jacobs] Ballou, who named their
daughter for two Richardson heroines), herself mother of Clemmie
Richmond Tucker (b. 1863).
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