The Romance of Names

In preparing this revised edition I have been able to make use of much information conveyed to me by readers interested in the subject. The general arrangement of the book remai...

The study of the origin of family names is at the same time quite simple and very difficult. Its simplicity consists in the fact that surnames can only come into existence in ce...

"Quelque diversité d'herbes qu'il y alt, tout s'enveloppe sous le nom de salade; de mesme, sous la considération des noms, je m'en voys faire icy une galimafree de divers articl...

Lat. alutarius, a "white-tawer", Similarly, Mid. Eng. stan-heawere, stone-hewer, is contracted to Stanier, now almost swallowed up by Stainer. The simple tawer is also one origi...

"That depends upon the taste and fancy of the speller, my lord," replied Sam. "I never had occasion to spell it more than once or twice in my life, but I spells it with a V."

"Talbots and Stanleys, St. Maurs and such-like folk, have led armies and made laws time out of mind; but those noble families would be somewhat astonished-if the accounts ever c...

"I was born in the year 1632, in the city of York, of a good family, though not of that country, my father being a foreigner of Bremen, who settled first at Hull. He got a good...

"Watte vocat, cui Thomme venit, neque Symme retardat, Betteque, Gibbe simul, Hykke venire jubent; Colle furit, quem Geffe juvat nocumenta parantes, Cum quibus ad dampnum Wille c...

Collins (Nicholas), Jennings (John, see Chapter X), Copping (Jacob, see Chapter I), Rawlin (Raoul, the French form of Radolf, whence Roll, Ralph, Relf), Paton (Patrick), Sisson...

The names of the Lowlands of Scotland are pretty much the same as those of northern England, with the addition of a very large French element, due to the close historical connec...

"England had now once more (A.D. 1100) a King born on her own soil, a Queen of the blood of the hero Eadmund, a King and Queen whose children would trace to AElfred by two desce...

medieval le dun, a colour nickname; names in Ead-, Ed-, are usually from the medieval female name Eda (Chapter VI); Sibbs generally belongs to Sibilla or Sebastian; Tait must so...

"Morz est Rollanz, Deus en ad l'anme es ciels. Li Emperere en Rencesvals parvient... Carles escriet: 'U estes vus, bels niés? U l'Arcevesques e li quens Oliviers? U est Gerins e...

from the town of Dreux. Walrond and Waldron are for Waleran, usually Galeran, and King Pippin had a retainer named Morant. Saint Leger, or Leodigarius, appears as Ledger, Ledgar...

Enguerrand is telescoped to Ingram, though this may also come from the English form Ingelram. Fawkes is the Old Fr. Fauques, nominative (Chapter VIII) of Faucon, i.e. falcon. Ga...

" 'O Now you see, brother Toby,' he would say, looking up, 'that Christian names are not such indifferent things;--had Luther here been called by any other name but Martin, he w...

Bardsley first drew attention to the very large number of surnames derived from an ancestress. His views have been subjected to much ignorant criticism by writers who, taking up...

There is an idea cherished by some people that the possession of a surname which is that of a village or other locality points to ancestral ownership of that region. This is a d...

Verstegan's couplet, even if it be not strictly true, makes a very good text for a discourse on our local names. The ham, or home, and the ton, or town, originally an enclosure...

"One fels downs firs, another of the same With crossed poles a little lodge doth frame: Another mounds it with dry wall about, And leaves a breach for passage in and out: With t...

that this name was given to the man who played the part of a "wild man of the woods" in processions and festivities. William Power, skinner, called "Wodehous," died in London in...

Not every Norman or Old French name need be included in the group described by Emerson when talking down to an uneducated audience. In fact, it is probable that the majority of...

The occupative name would, especially in villages, tend to become a very natural surname. It is not therefore surprising to find so large a number of this class among our common...

The fairly common name Rutter is a good example of the difficulty of explaining a surname derived from a trade or calling no longer practised. Even so careful an authority as Ba...

"In Southwerk at the Tabard as I lay, Redy to wenden on my pilgrymage, To Caunterbury with ful devout corage, At nyght were come into that hostelrye Wel nyne and twenty in a com...

In the Middle Ages there was no great class of retail dealers distinct from the craftsmen who fashioned objects. The same man made and sold in almost every case. There were of c...

"Jacque, il me faut troubler ton Somme; Dans le village, un gros huissier Rôde et court, suivi du messier. C'est pour l'impôt, las! mon pauvre homme. Lève-toi, Jacque, lève-toi:...

It is a well-known fact that official nomenclature largely reflects the simple housekeeping of early times, and that many titles, now of great dignity, were originally associate...

"Here is Wyll Wyly the myl pecker, And Patrick Pevysshe heerbeter, With lusty Hary Hangeman, Nexte house to Robyn Renawaye; Also Hycke Crokenec the rope maker, And Steven Mesyll...

"The man replied that he did not know the object of the building; and to make it quite manifest that he really did not know, he put an adjective before the word 'object,' and an...

The great majority of nicknames coming under the headings typified by Bird and Fowell, Best, and Fish or Fisk (Scand.) are easily identified. But here, as everywhere in the subj...