Family Names and Family History [Hardcover]

David Hey (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 5, 2003 | ISBN-10: 1852852550 | ISBN-13: 978-1852852559 | Edition: First Edition

Family names are an essential part of everyone's personal history. The story of their evolution is integral to family history and fascinating in its own right. Formed from first names, nicknames and occupations, names allow us to trace the movements of our ancestors from the middle ages to the present day. David Hey shows how, when and where families first got their names, and proves that most families stayed close to their places of origin. Settlement patterns and family groupings can be traced back towards their origins by using national and local records. Family Names and Family History tells everyone interested in tracing their own name how to set about doing so.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Talk to very large number of people about their surname and you will find that the family came in with the Conqueror ... William evidently had a very easy time of it. It is clear that he had only a handful of opponents to meet, and that the story of the Battle of Hastings, is a gross historical fraud." --C. W. Bardsley

Book Description

Family names are an essential part of everyone's personal history. The story of their evolution is integral to family history and fascinating in its own right. Formed from first names, nicknames and occupations, names allow us to trace the movements of our ancestors from the middle ages to the present day. David Hey shows how, when and where families first got their names, and proves that most families stayed close to their places of origin. Settlement patterns and family groupings can be traced back towards their origins by using national and local records. Family Names and Family History tells everyone interested in tracing their own name how to set about doing so.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 224 pages
• Publisher: Hambledon & London; First Edition edition (February 5, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1852852550
• ISBN-13: 978-1852852559
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.4 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,149,311 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating and scholarly introduction to English names, July 23, 2002

By 

Michael K. Smith (South Louisiana) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Family Names and Family History (Hardcover)

One thing all family researchers necessarily have in common, regardless of ethnicity, is an interest in names. In this connection, you're fortunate if you have some English ancestry, for many less common surnames are still largely peculiar to one English county or another. The author's own surname places his origins in the West Riding of Yorkshire; he notes that he is quite used to seeing such names as "Staniforth" and "Broomhead," but that "southern" names such as "Gulliver" or "Loder" still catch his eye as being non-local -- which must seem very strange to most Americans. Hey, a professor of local history, leads the reader carefully through the historical immigration process -- Anglo-Saxon, Danish, Norman, Dutch, Flemish, Huguenot -- that affected the development of English surnames, outlines the methods available to determine the most likely place of origin of a family name not only in the 17th century (and earlier) but also in the modern mobile world. He traces many names as examples (they have their own index), and alerts the researcher to avoidable pitfalls; "Custer" is a common name in Berkshire, but the General's surname actually was anglicized from the Dutch name "Koster." Hey provides only the beginning of surname research, as his bibliography makes clear, but this engrossing volume is a good place to start.

5.0 out of 5 stars Book Nitty-Gritty, October 21, 2010

By 

Theseus "theseus" (US of A) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Family Names and Family History (Hardcover)

This review is for the hardback from Hambledon, first released in 2000.

Hardback in dustjacket: navy cloth over boards with gold print. With dustjacket. 240 pp. Illustrated with portraits and maps.

Index, Index of names, 7 pp of bibliographic information.