78 



find himself securely seated on the throne than he rigorously established 

 the Feudal System of the Continent by parcelling the land among his 

 followers, and these Norman Feudatories for the sake of distinction were 

 generally known by the name of the place w^hence they had set forth in 

 their Norman home. Hence are due such names as Granville, Boville, 

 Neville, Tankerville, Colville, VilHers, Beaumont, Harcourt, <fec. For 

 several generations these surnames were prefixed by the preposition de, o/, 

 or from, as Hugh De Granville, i.e. Hugh of the great house or town, 

 and so on, but in course of time these prefixes were either cast aside or 

 became incorporated, as Delamere, Delisle, Defontaine, Deville, (kc. 

 Dilstou Castle, the Northumbrian seat of the last Earl of Derwentwater, 

 it may be noticed in passing, is a contracted form of this latter name, 

 Deville and the suffix ton an enclosure — i.e. Deville's ton. The time was 

 now come when a second name or surname was becoming absolutely 

 necessary throughout society generally for distinction's sake. We have 

 seen that for some centuries preceding the Conquest the custom had been 

 in use in particular cases, but in every instance such surnames which were 

 almost in all cases of the descriptive class, passed away with the lives of 

 the owners. They did not become hereditary, i.e. they were not handed 

 down from one generation to another. Now, however, a change was to 

 take i^lace "Slowly at first, and silently and unpremeditatedly but 

 nevertheless surely," — I am quoting the words of a writer upon the subject, 

 — -"it came to pass that the name by which one man was distinguished from 

 another became part and parcel of his property and passed with his other 

 property to his direct descendants." It is impossible to fix upon any 

 particular epoch or indeed any particiilar reign when surnames first became 

 hereditary, but speaking genei'ally it may be said that the custom arose 

 in the latter part of the 11th century or early in the 12th, and continued 

 until the close of the 14th, i.e. the time of Chaucer, before our present 

 nomenclature was completed. The Normans undoiibtedly gave the first 

 impulse to this new fashion by adopting as a distinguishing name the 

 residential or Place-name. How long the custom was in finding its way 

 into our own then remote part of England we have no means of .ascer- 

 taining but that it did find its way here we have undoubted proof in the 



