Surname Origins, Their Source and Significations (1875)

where the descendants of the primitive settlers are found. All are derived from the Scriptures, or are of that fancy character, a love of which arose with their Puritan forefathers. Appellations such as 'Seth,' or 'Abel,' or 'Lot,' or 'Jonas,' or 'Asa,'or 'Jabez,'or Abijah,' or 'Phineas,' or 'Priscilla,'or 'Epaphroditus,' abound on every hand. Sobriquets like 'Faith,' and 'Hope,' and 'Charity,' and 'Patience,'and 'Prudence,' and 'Grace,' and 'Mercy,'have be-come literally as household words, and names yet more uncouth and strange may be heard every day, sounding oddly indeed to English ears. There would seem to have been a revulsion of feeling, even from such of the Biblical names as had lived in the earlier centuries of our history, as if the connexion of 'Peter,'and 'John,' and 'James,' and 'Thomas' with others of more pagan origin had made them unworthy of further use; certain it is, that these are in no way so familiar with them as with us. Such are the strange humours that pass over the hearts of men and communities. Such are the changes that the nomenclature of peoples, as well as of places and things, undergo through the more extraordinary convulsions which sometimes seize the body corporate of society. Truly it is a strange story this that our surnames tell us. 'What's in a name?' in the light of all this, seems indeed but a pleasantry, meant to denote how full, how teeming with the story of our lives is each — as so they are.

CHAPTER II. LOCAL SURNAMES.

IN wellnigh every country where personal nomenclature has assumed a sure and settled basis, that is, where a second or surname has become an hereditary possession in the family, we shall find that that portion of it which is of local origin bears by far the largest proportion to the whole. We could well proceed, therefore, to this class apart from any other motive, but when we further reflect that it is this local class which in the first instance became hereditary, we at once perceive an additional claim upon our attention.

I need scarcely say at the outset that, as with all countries so with England, prefixes of various kinds were at first freely used to declare more particularly whence the nominee was sprung. Thus, if he were come from some town or city he would be 'William of York,' or 'John of Bolton,' this enclitic being familiarly pronounced 'a,' as 'William a York,' or 'John a Bolton.' For instance, it is said in an old poem anent Robin Hood

It had been better of William a Trent To have been abed with sorrowe;