Family Names of the United Kingdom 2

The proposed project, referred to below as FaNUK2, is to enlarge and to significantly enhance, in five additional ways, the resource created by the previously funded FaNUK1 project (2010-14), which seeks to explain the linguistic origin of all family names (FNs) in the UK with 100 or more bearers in the baseline year of 1997, and to establish as far as possible their geographical distribution and history for the benefit of genealogists, family historians, academic linguists (philologists), historians, and human geographers, as well as interested members of the general public.

(1) This bid is for support principally to lower the threshold for inclusion of traditional, established FNs in the database from those with 100 or more bearers in our baseline year 1997 to those with 20 bearers or more in our updated baseline year 2012. This will involve conducting entirely new research on about 15,000 additional FNs, not one of which has ever been satisfactorily explained. The definition of "traditional, established" FNs for this purpose is as in the current project (FaNUK1): names present both in the 1881 census and in our 1997 (2012) data. When this is done we can reasonably claim to have presented as nearly complete an account of the family names of the UK as is achievable in the present state of documented knowledge.

The new resource will be enhanced by the addition of other material and of hypertext links to relevant web sites or other means of accessing that material, in the following ways:

(2) In the course of FaNUK1 we have incidentally assembled information about several thousand recent immigrant names whose frequency of between 50 and 99 in the 1997 data means that they fall outside the scope of the deliverable of FaNUK1. This information will now be checked, enhanced where practicable, and entered in FaNUK2, though without further systematic research in all relevant languages.

(3=) At present, the database does not systematically explain the origin of place-names (like Worcester) or topographical descriptions (like Bourne, 'stream') which give rise to FNs. There are many such FNs, and we have agreement in principle with the English Place-Name Society (EPNS) to use its collected data to explain their origin for users of FaNUK2. This information will be made available through the JISC-funded DEEP project, whose purpose is precisely to make EPNS material available to academic projects and other academic users. Our present wish is to include a button in database entries which will take users directly to EPNS-derived material in the form of a summary etymology. This could be done for many though not all of the relevant place-names.

(3=) At present, the database does not systematically explain the origin of the given-names ("first names") underlying FNs of relationship; for example, the words behind names of Continental Germanic origin such as *Alice* or the Anglo-Saxon *Edmund* are not explained. This will be done for the 400 or so names for which it is relevant, though a certain amount of original research will be needed on some name-elements.

(5) We have negotiated with the author of the British Surname Atlas, Stephen Archer, for permission to use or adapt certain FN distribution maps in the research database which will constitute the output deliverable to AHRC.

(6) We will return to those relatively few difficult names which eluded explanation in FaNUK1 (because of time constraints) and which we already believe are capable of being resolved with further philological and documentary (historical and geographical) work.

Our estimate of the length of time in which all this could be achieved is 33 months.

Those likely to be interested in and benefit from the proposed project include:

1. Amateur and professional genealogists and family historians, mainly outside academia

The principal value of the resource created will be as a guide to surname variation and distribution, helping researchers to pursue or discard hypothesized family links.

2. Archivists and cataloguers

A by-product of the research done for FaNUK1, continuing into FaNUK2, will be the creation of medieval <--> modern surname indexes which can be used by cataloguers. Some advance work has already been embarked on to this effect with The National Archives.

3. Members of the public participating in the current considerable level of popular interest in family history

4. Teachers using the FaNUK material as an aid when dealing with cultural and historical issues, especially concerning identity


We believe that the work is likely to be of considerable interest to the general public, will serve to increase the amount of reliable knowledge in public circulation in an area which is pursued by many people both seriously and as a hobby, and will thereby enhance quality of life.

The public impact will be felt piecemeal, name-search by name-search, immediately on publication.


*** Research and professional skills which staff working on the project will develop which is applicable in a range of employment sectors include:

1. Organizing very large quantities of complex data

2. Computation database and spreadsheet management

3. Giving public presentations taking research methods and findings beyong academia, i.e. introducing non-academic audiences to the findings of scholarly research in a "user-friendly" style and thereby contributing to a perception of the "accessibility" and "relevance" of academic work in the humanities.

4. Giving presentations of the project material in schools with a view to stimulating historical and linguistic awareness and contributing to debate about identity