Family Names

[poliphilo]

Here's a site (belonging to University College London) that documents the geographical spread of family names in the U.K. The Guardian drew my attention to it. Not surprisingly it's getting a lot of hits at the moment.  

If you have an English/British family name, this site will pinpoint where in the UK people with that name  were concentrated in the sample years of 1882 and 1998 and so- by deduction- where the name originates.

My family name turns out to be West Country. More specifically from the area round Bath. 

Ailz's family name- no surprises here- is deep Lancashire.

Comments

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I've looked at quite a few names now. It's interesting the way names "behave". For example, in 1881 there weren't any Andersons to speak of outside Scotland, but since then they've sort of slid down the East coast. I'd have expected people to scatter in all directions, but in fact there seems to be a much more organic pattern of movement.