Etymology

Definition: Etymology is the study of the history of words, their origins, and how their form and meaning have changed over time.

As many surnames are based on everyday words of the past, understanding how their sound and spelling has changed over time can be a very important consideration for any genealogist. Etymologists are often called upon by historians to date manuscripts and documents of indeterminate age by analysing how the words are spelt and structured. That analysis can be revealing because it usually places the document within a particular time frame and the significance of this is no less for the spelling of names.

It would be inappropriate, therefore, in all but exceptional circumstances to attempt to trace the origin of surnames without considering all possible variants of the name. It would not have been unusual for our ancestors to have their birth name recorded with one spelling, their marriage recorded with another and their tombstone engraved with a third version. Too often the difference in documented name spelling is attributed to poor standards of literacy and this is certainly true if we are referring to any time in the last hundred years or so. However, spelling conventions as we know them today were not fully developed until the early 16th century when the language underwent a significant vowel shift which marked the beginning of what we now refer to as modern English. Codification of English was not fully completed until the 19th century however and despite English being the 'international business language' it is one of the very few major languages that does not have an official regulatory body. Little wonder, therefore, that we will find different surname spelling within the same family – in many cases as long as it sounded the same it really did not matter how it was spelt. Therefore wrong and right as we know it today was not necessarily a consideration in the distant past.

History of English Names

'What's in a name? 'Very much, if the wit of man could find it out'. The origins of this old saying is unknown, but in England alone there are some 45,000 individual surnames....and each one has at least one story attached to it.

Names have numerous origins but typically they are derived from trades, physical attributes, places, nicknames, objects and heraldic charges. Prior to the Norman invasion of Britain, people did not use hereditary names but were nicknamed or given a personal singular name. The idea of a first name followed by a hereditary second name had not yet been conceived. Having a single name identifier was acceptable when communities were tiny but as communities grew, identifiers had to become more specific to avoid confusion. This led to names such as John the short, William the butcher, Thomas from Sutton, Alice of the wood, Stephen son of Richard etc.. Variations of these early identifiers still exist but in all probability would have undergone several changes, if not in terms of the general identifier itself but in the way that it had an acceptable way of being spelt at any given time. This change in spelling conventions (or the absence of a convention) is an important consideration for anyone tracing family names. A good example how the spelling of words change is 'Cleere' as it is an archaic (middle English) way of spelling the current adjective/adverb 'clear'.

Title of book from which the passage is taken.

THE EUCHARISTIC UNDERSTANDING OF JOHN COSIN AND HIS CONTRIBUTION TO THE 1662 BOOK OF COMMON PRAYER

'Cleere' was also used as an adverb for the current word 'Clear' or 'Clearly' in middle English (11th - 15th century). One of the most common examples of this is Chaucer's use of it in Canterbury Tales.

The Tale of Sir Thopas

 ......And again in

The General Prologue - The Monk

A modern translation of this would be

There was a Monk. Here was a rising man;
All the estates of his abbey he ran,
He loved to hunt, was forceful and well able
to be an abbot. There were in his stable
Fine horses. When he rode out you could hear
Their bridles jingling on the wind as clear
And quite as loudly as did the chapel bell
At that priory where he had charge as well

There is an interesting use of the 'Al' and 'Als' before 'cleere' - these translate to 'As' or 'Also' in modern English but are either Dutch or German in origin - another example of how the English language evolved from external influences.

After the conquest of 1066, surnames were introduced into England by the Normans and as their grip on power and influence spread, so did the use of a second name as the basis of an identifier. Initially, second names were adopted as a means of identification only but over time the surname was synonymous with the family and became hereditary. So, surnames based on nicknames, trades, places, etc. were handed down to the next generation and we now have inherited names such as Fletcher, Green, Wilkins, Redhead, Pickering, Smith and Johnson that are witnesses to their descriptive origins.

By the early 15th century most English people and lowland inhabitants of Scotland had adopted the use of surnames and these were considered as family names to be handed down to the next generation and carried on from there through the male line. Most Saxon names such as Oswin, Osway and Oslaf disappeared shortly after the Norman conquest because of the persecution of Britons to a level that would be regarded as genocide today.

The formation of new surnames from old ones continued long after the 15th century in England. Many Scottish, particularly the highlanders and indigenous Irish are derived from Gaelic personal names. The Welsh adopted the English surname system in 1536 following the unification of the two countries.

In terms of tracing family history this time period is too far back to be any real value to genealogy enthusiasts except perhaps in pinpointing a particular area where the name is prevalent today. It must be remembered that many families over the generations will have taken an alias or simply changed their name (possibly through adoption) at some point for legal, political or whimsical reasons. Another, but very important consideration when tracing genealogical roots is whether the surname in question has the same sound as another name that originated from a different source. A good example of this is the family name 'Collins' which derives from two separate sources, one being an Irish clan name and the other from the English personal name 'Nicolas'.

No research has ever been seriously undertaken for the origins of the 'Cleere' surname and it is quite possible that there are two or more unrelated sources. This is particularly true of any name that is descriptive in nature and the three literary examples shown above would suggest that it is not impossible that 'Cleere' could have been bestowed on someone at some point in time as an appropriate nickname because of their appearance or circumstances. This could be a completely independent source from the more accepted French/Norman origin.

With the above in mind if ascertaining the original source of a surname is the intention, then it is important not to place too much emphasis on a particular name or spelling if the bloodline cannot be traced through the generations; probably as far back as the 14th century.

In summary, it is important to remember that both forenames and surnames are subject to singular or cumulative variations in spelling and as standardised spelling did not arrive until the 19th century, variations are bound to have occurred up until recent times. One need only record the number of times that mail is delivered with incorrect names to see how difficult it is to maintain consistency through time.

Go back to Cleere Origin Index

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