Antica famiglia originaria di Firenze. Hanno avuto un priore e provato il Quarto nella religione di S. Stefano. Ne era la Casa di Pier Giovanni in via de’ Ginori, ed è spenta, ed è stata ereditata tutta la sua roba dalla compagnia di San Marco per erogare le annuali entrate in Opere pie. Il fasto e le gesta antiche della famiglia Chiaro accompagnata con la scarsezza delle scritture non lascia scorgere il prinicipio della sua nobiltà; e perciò a ragione gli scrittori e ricercatori confessono con tutta la loro investigazione di non sapere accertare la sua origine; ma non vedendo noi addurre ragione alcuna per farci credere questa opinione, che tiene anche dubbia, potremo ancor noi proferire la nostra, non opinione, ma certezza evidente, mentre viene da noi appoggiata ad alcune evidenti ragioni che non sanno mentire. Trovansi Scrittori anche di concetto non volgare, i quali per aver’osservato, che in diverse Città del Mondo sparsamente fioriscono famiglie dell’istesso cognome, per antica nobiltà conspicue, si sono posti a farle apparire tutte derivanti da un sol ceppo; il che avvenga non sia ad essi riuscito di effettuare con tutta quella chiarezza, che desiderare si potrebbe nella descrizione della Genealogia di questa Casata.. Riguardo a questo cognome abbiamo ritrovato ulteriori informazioni storiche in altri archivi. Purtroppo in lingua originale Inglese. : The Italian Last Name of CHIARO was primarily a female given name primarily extrapolated from the Latin CLARUS (famous) which achieved a moderate popularity, greater on the Continent than in England through the fame of St. Clare of Assisi (1194-1253). She was an Italian Christian saint, daughter of County Favorino Scifi and elder sister of St. Agnes. At the age of 18 she became a follower of St. Francis, and with him and her younger sister, founded the order of Poor Ladies of San Damiano (‘Poor Clares’, formerly called Minoresses’) of which she became abbess. She was canonized in 1255, and in 1958 was designated patron saint of television by Pope Pius XI on the grounds that at Christmas, 1252, when she was in her cell at San Damiano, she ‘saw and heard’ a service being held in the church of St. Francis in Assisi. Her feast day is 12th August. As the agricultural depression of southern Italy worsened towards the end of the 19th century, people started to escape to the New World. The exodus started in earnest in 1887 with Brazil and other parts of Latin America being the original destinations. By 1893, the economy had improved in the United States and people headed there from Italy in greater and greater numbers. In 1898 there were more Italian immigrants to the USA than from any other state. In the post war era, more than a quarter of Italians left the state for a new life. They joined a flood of immigrants to America which was averaging a million a year in the pre war years. The origins of Italian last names are not clear, and much work remains to be done on medieval Italian records. It seems that stable bynames, in some cases hereditary, were in use in the Venetian Republic by the end of the 10th century. The typical Italian Last Name endings are ‘i’ and ‘o’, the former being characteristic of northern Italy. The singular form ‘o’ is more typical of southern Italy. In the Middle Ages heraldry came into use as a practical matter. It originated in the devices used to distinguish the armoured warriors in tournament and war, and was also placed on seals as marks of identity. As far as records show, true heraldry started in the middle of the 12th century, and appeared almost simultaneously in several states of Western Europe….
Noble title: Nobili
Coat of arms: D’argento al leone armato e coronato d’oro…