07/07/2025
From a rainy start to a powerful journey: my guest, researching the Italian roots behind the surname Esposito, stood before the very place that gave origin to it.
This is the Ruota degli Esposti, one of Naples' most moving and overlooked places, where countless newborns were anonymously entrusted to the Ospedale dell’Annunziata, and where Esposito became more than a name, it became history.
The ruota allowed the anonymous abandonment of infants, often born out of wedlock, poverty, or social stigma.
Desperate mothers, often alone, shamed or too poor, would place their babies in the rotating wooden drum, ring a bell, and disappear.
Inside, nuns would receive the child, who’d be given the surname Esposito: from esposto, Latin exponere, meaning “to put out” or “to expose.”
📍Naples, always deeper than it seems.
Curious about your roots, or the stories hidden in the streets of Naples?
Let’s walk through them together.
