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Doria, originally de Auria (from de filiis Auriae), meaning "the sons of Auria", and then de Oria or d'Oria, is the name of an old Genoese family who played a major role in the history of the Republic of Genoa from the 12th century to the 16th century. Legend has that a noble Genoese lady named Auria or Oria della Volta fell in love with a noble pilgrim who was going to Jerusalem for the First Crusade; his name was Arduino di Narbonne but their children were named after the mother — de Oria, the children of Oria.

Documentary evidence refers to two members of that family, Martino and Genuardo, in 1110; they are called filiis Auriae (the sons of Oria), which makes at least part of the family legend plausible. The Doria had fiefs in Sardinia from the 12th century to the 15th century, and also in Dolceacqua, Oneglia and Portofino, in the Riviera to the west of Genoa.

Simon Doria lived in the late 12th century and was an admiral of the Genoese in the crusader's assault against Saint Jean d'Acre. Percivalle Doria, who died in 1275 fighting for the Ghibelline, was an infamous warlord and a well-known Provençal poet. Also a poet, Simon Doria was podestà of Savona and Albenga. The brothers Oberto Doria and Lamba Doria were naval commanders and politicians: Oberto was Captain of the People in Genoa and led its naval forces in the victory of La Meloria against Pisa in 1284 while Lamba won a major battle against Venetian Andrea Dandolo at Curzola in 1298. Tedisio Doria (or Teodosio) financed the expedition of Vadino and Ugolino Vivaldi in 1291. Branca Doria is mentioned by Dante in the Divine Comedy because of his treacherous murder of Michele Zanche, his father-in-law, in 1275. Brancaleone Doria ruled the Giudicato of Arborea and nearly conquered the whole of Sardinia in the late fourteenth century. The most remarkable member of the family is Admiral Andrea Doria, Prince of Melfi (1466-1560), who re-established the Genoese Republic.

Non-agnatic princely branches like the Colonna-Doria are still flourishing. There are also titled branches outside Italy, such as the Porrata Doria family in Spain, which rank as marquesses.

The Doria clan helped finance the Portuguese and Spanish navigations in the late 15th and 16th centuries. A Lodisio Doria, knight of Christ's Order, settled in the island of Madeira in 1480, where he became involved in the sugar trade. Their descendants are the Teixeira Doria and França Doria families, which also have as ancestor Portuguese navigator Tristão Vaz, one of the discoverers of the Madeira island. The França Doria branch is headed today by the Viscount of Torre Bela.

Francesco Doria, a banker at Seville, financed Christopher Columbus, and his son Aleramo Doria was a banker to King John III of Portugal until 1556. Finally, Aleramo's daughter Clemenza Doria was one of the earliest settlers in the 16th century Portuguese colonization of Brazil. Clemenza Doria married twice; her second husband was Fernão Vaz da Costa (c. 1520-1567), son of Portuguese Chief Justice Cristóvão da Costa and a great-grandson of the legendary navigator Soeiro da Costa.

[edit] See also

• Doria Pamphilj Gallery
• Doria-Pamphilii-Landi
• Ambrosio Spinola, marqués de los Balbases, Ambrosio Spinola Doria

[edit] References

• Teresa Luzzatto Guerrini, I Doria, Novissima Enciclopedia Monografica Illustrata, Florence (1937).
• Clemente Fusero, I Doria, dall'Oglio (1973).
• Documentary sources at the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Lisbon (Portugal)

After years of speculation about his romantic life and a weekend flurry of hot rumors, John F. Kennedy Jr. was reported yesterday to have been married on Saturday to Carolyn Bessette, his girlfriend, in a private ceremony at a small resort on a secluded Georgia barrier island.

Judge Martin O. Gillette of Camden County Probate Court, whose office is in Woodbine, Ga., confirmed late last night that his office had issued the couple a marriage license on Thursday, though the license had not been returned to confirm that a ceremony occurred.

Usually, couples fill out the license questionnaire together at the courthouse, the judge said, but Ms. Bessette and Mr. Kennedy asked to be questioned separately aboard different planes at St. Mary's Airport near Cumberland Island. Ms. Bessette was questioned at 6:15 P.M. and Mr. Kennedy at 7:30 P.M. by two of the judge's clerks, he said.

''They wanted privacy,'' Judge Gillette said.

There was no wedding announcement, and members of the Kennedy family who may have attended the ceremony -- including Senator Edward M. Kennedy and the groom's sister, Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg -- said nothing as they hurried to planes yesterday at an airport a few miles from Cumberland Island, where the wedding and a reception apparently took place.

But Ms. Schlossberg responded with a thumbs-up sign when a television crew shouted questions about reports of the wedding. And the groom's cousin, Representative Patrick Kennedy, a Rhode Island Democrat, provided what seemed to be more certain confirmation yesterday at a political appearance in Steubenville, Ohio.

''My cousin John did tie the knot yesterday,'' Patrick Kennedy said, according to The Associated Press. He made the comments at a fund-raiser for a fellow Democrat, State Senator Robert Burch, who is running for a seat in the House of Representatives. Mr. Kennedy gave no details of the wedding, to which he was not invited, but his spokesman, Larry Berman, confirmed that Ms. Bessette was the bride. ''I think it was, from what we heard, very small,'' he told The A.P.

The 35-year-old son of President John F. Kennedy and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis had been the object of gossip and speculation for years in tabloids that have dubbed him ''The Sexiest Man Alive'' and ''America's Most Eligible Bachelor.'' He had been romantically linked for five years to Ms. Bessette, 28, who most recently worked in public relations for Calvin Klein Ltd. in New York City.

Mr. Kennedy, the co-founder and editor of George, a magazine of political commentary, ended a lengthy relationship with the actress Darryl Hannah not long after his mother's death in 1994. Last September, Mr. Kennedy denied reports that he and Ms. Bessette were engaged, but over the past year they were seen together in New York and at the Kennedy compound at Hyannis, on Cape Cod. The couple were videotaped last February in a New York park having what was taken to be a lover's quarrel. It was shown on television and turned up in newspapers and magazines.

New York magazine reported last week that Mr. Kennedy, apparently seeking privacy, had made wedding plans without divulging the date or place even to many of his closest relatives and friends.

Fewer than a dozen people were reported to have attended the ceremony at 4 P.M. Saturday in a chapel on Cumberland Island, an unspoiled barrier beach in the southeast corner of Georgia that was once a vacation home for the Carnegie family. The wedding party stayed on the island at Greyfield Inn, a bed-and-breakfast resort, where a reception was held.

The Cumberland Island National Seashore on the island is operated by the National Park Service, which has a small staff there. The Florida Times-Union in Jacksonville reported, however, that security was unusually high on the island over the weekend, with private guards turning the curious away from Greyfield Inn. The newspaper also quoted a park volunteer as saying that members of the Kennedy family were on the island and had been arriving under the cover of darkness for several days at Fernandina Airport in Fernandina Beach, eight miles south of the island, just across the Florida state line.

Friends of the Kennedy family said that the groom's uncle, Senator Edward Kennedy, flew down on Friday evening. Danny Newton, of Island Aviation Services at the airport, said yesterday that the Senator, with a party of eight people, and Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg, with one or two companions, had left the airport in separate private planes yesterday shortly before 1 P.M.