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-ilie/-ilia was a fashionable name ending in the 19th century (with names like Ottilie, Emilie/Emilia, and similar names ending in -alie/-alia like Nathalia or Amalia). The motivation of the inital Mat(h) is more difficult to pin down---in fact impossible without additional information about parent names or godfather names. Besides Mathilde, candidate source names include Matthias, Magdalena (c.f. Maddalena), Martin or Martha (in regions where a pre-consonantal r is dropped).

This message was edited 11/6/2014, 1:11 AM