Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland

[kiterunner]

I was just reading in the newspaper about this new book, where the researchers have done a lot of new research on surnames and their origins and come up with different explanations for the origins of some surnames from the old ones. It is a massive book and costs £400 so I don't suppose even many libraries will be able to afford to buy it in these straitened times, but it came up in the list of e-books in "Oxford Reference" in my local library's online reference section. Sadly it shows as "restricted access", so I can only see which surnames are included but not read the entries. Anyway, they haven't included Glascodine or Glasscodine although the newspaper article was going on about how they have included very rare surnames.

[Merry]

Sadly, no sign of it in the online reference items at my local library. :(

[kiterunner]

I have found lots of sites (including ITV news, Irish Genealogy news etc so looks legit) which say that online access is free until the end of November using login fanbi, password onlineaccess, and it worked for me. Sorry to say that I doubt that their explanation for the origin of the surname Bowskill is correct, since it is mainly a Nottinghamshire surname: "locative name from any of three places in Cumberland: Bowscale in Ulpha, Borrowscale in Matterdale, or Borrowscale in Torpenhow."

Link to site:
http://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780199677764.001.0001/acref-9780199677764

[Merry]

Hmmm.....well I entered one of the rarer surnames from my tree and discovered it is from Cornwall/Devon which is what I had already established despite the majority of those holding the name living in Northumberland in the 18th and 19thCs.

On the other hand, for my own birth surname they said they had just under 3000 matches in 1881, but using the spelling variants they suggested I found 5,500, so almost double. Plus whilst they said in 1881 the greatest frequency was in Lancs which I hadn't realised, but confirmed as correct, they also said Kent had a good proportion of the name, but according to ancestry Kent only had half what Gloucestershire had in 1881, but Gloucestershire only had the lowest level of highlight on the map. They said my name originals from Staffs/Derbyshire which might be right, I don't know!

Thanks for the link though. I may have another look later, as I forgot to contact fmp re the 1939 register problems and I won't have time to do that today now. Will do it on Friday. *sets self a reminder*

[Olde Crone]

I looked at this last week and was terribly disappointed. It seems to be a rehash from several of the standard works with a bit of perfunctory additional research. I certainly don't agree that Holden is a locative name and I have found many earlier refs to the name than the ones they quote.

The only new information is statistical geographic frequency. Not sure how that helps!

OC