Hebrew-English Guide to Soncino

11 THE HISTORY OF SONCINO THE NAME “SONCINO” The toponym is attested in 920 as “Castri soncini” and in 959 as “de Sencine”, while in a document of 1144 we find “Sencinum”. The name would derive from Sö (water) and Kyn (lord): Sukkin, Sowkin, lord of the waters. THE LAKE GERUNDO Anciently in the area among the provinces of Bergamo, Milan, Cre- mona, Mantua and Lodi, in the stretch that from Cassano d’Adda goes almost to Cremona for about two hundred square kilometers, in the Middle Ages, there was a lake called “Gerundo” (from the Lom- bard dialect word gèra, gerù, gerùnwhichmeans “gravel”). Fed by the rivers Adda, Serio and Oglio, it covered a very large territory: from Treviglio to Pizzighettone and from Lodi to Soncino. In the center of this stretch of water there was the Insula Fulcheria, an island with a Longobard name on which the town of Crema was born. Its disappearance can be attributed to the work of reclamation of the monks of the abbeys and in particular to the work of strengthening of the Muzza canal by the Lodigians, as well as because of drainage factors and geological settlements. Many finds demonstrate the existence of Lake Gerundo, such as the discovery of numerous pirogues found in the rivers that characte- rize the territory, demonstrating that the lake was navigable. One of the most beautiful and best preserved examples is visible in the Crema Museum.