ORIGIN AND CHANGES OF SURNAMES.
THE use of established surnames cannot be traced much earlier than the mid-
dle of the tenth century. They first came into use in Normandy, in France,
and at the coming of William the Conqueror were quite generally introduced
into England. Many of the Norman adventurers who assisted in the Conquest,
had taken the names of their residences, or of villages near their ancestral
chateaux, names that were used with the French preposition de before them.
Nearly all of the soldiers of William's army went back to their homes in Nor-
mandy, and bestowed the lands awarded them in England upon their younger
sons, who came over and settled upon them, giving to these new estates their
own names. When the Norman-French disappeared from England, the prefix
de was completely discarded, unless retained for euphony, and the word "of”
used as a substitute. The Scotch have a more expressive designation
which they apply to families who have a territorial name; they say, "of that
ilk." In Scotland, surnames were seldom used till the twelfth century,
and were for a long time variable. The assumption of surnames by the
common people is everywhere of later date than that by the gentle families.
In England, the number of surnames is about forty thousand, or one to every
five hundred individuals; in Scotland, far fewer surnames in proportion to the
population. Surnames may be divided into several classes, as territorial, char-
acteristic, mechanical, and personal. The names, Fairbanks, Burbank, Burn-
ham, Washburn, Woodbridge, Woodbury, Bradbury, Mansfield, Kilburn, Swin-
burn, and Riddell, are all territorial in origin. The names, Carpenter, Turner,
Weaver, Brewer, Boulter, Chaplin, Goldsmith, Wheelwright, Gardner, Baxter,
and Usher, are all derived from the occupation of ancestors of those families.
Among the surnames taken from some characteristic of the individual who first
used them, are Walker, Sleeper, Springer, Armstrong, Longstaff, Goodman,
Lockheart, Douglass, Broadhead, and Longfellow.
The reasons for the use of surnames are obvious. In localities where there
were individuals of the same Christian name, they were distinguished by
such names as "John the Cartwright" and "John the Carpenter"; and in a
short time these becamed fixed family surnames. This would be true of two
persons of one Christian name, dwelling in the same community, the one at
Fairbanks, and the other at Mansfield; one would be known as "William of
Fairbanks," the other as "William of Mansfield," hence these names, so common
in England and America.
The original surname from which the various forms of orthography now used
by the numerous branches of the family whose genealogy is found in this book
