Annetta Stampa was not beautiful. She was handsome. The distinction already says something important about this forceful, extraordinary woman. She was about the same height as her husband, physically vigorous, with a prominent nose, dark eyes, and black, wiry hair. In her bearing there was something commanding, though at the same time outgoing and warm. Throughout her life, which proved to be an exceptionally long one, she made a powerful impression on others, and most of all, on the members of her own family. The Stampas were people of means. They owned houses and land. Thus, like his father, Giovanni Giacometti married a woman who was able to better his condition in life. An excellent cook, fasittious housekeeper, and vigilant holder of purse strings, she assured the family's well-being and comfort during the years before Giovanni's paintings began to sell. She was a woman of indomitable resolve and principle, went to church regularly, and held a stern view of propriety. Yet she was not provincial or narrow-minded. She read the newspapers and her house was well supplied with books. She loved talk, especially a good argument, and had a ready sense of humor. Knowing what she thought about most things, including art, she never hesitated to speak her mind. Borgonovo, "the new village," lies along a gentle slope about a mile up the valley from Stampa. Annetta had been born there. Her parents lived there, and it was there in the Church of San Giorgio, where his father's funeral had taken place only 8 months before, that Giovanni Giacometti was married to Annetta Stampa on the 4th of October 1900. And it was in Borgonovo that the newly married couple first settled. They rented an apartment on the second floor of a plain three-story house in the center of the village. Giovanni may have been a mild-mannered, temperate, and unassuming man, but, like his father, he proved to be a potent husband. Three months after their wedding his wife became pregnant, and at one o'clock in the morning on the 10th of October 1901, their first child, a son, was born. The happy parents named him Giovanni Alberto Giacometti. Because his father's name was also Giovanni, the child was never called anything but Alberto by his parents or by anyone else, and the name certainly suited him, for it means illustrious through nobility. In time, everyone, and even he, may have forgotten that Alberto's first name was Giovanni, but the fact--and its significance--remained…. [From Giacometti: A Biography by James Lord, found on Googlebooks.