Badsworth

Recorded as Badworth, Badsworth, Bedworth, Bodworth and Bodsworth, this is an English locational surname. It originates either from the ancient village of Badsworth, in the county of West Yorkshire, or possibly the equally old Bedworth in Warwickshire. Bedworth is recorded inte famous Domesady Book of 1086 as Bedeword of Beda's wood, whilst Badsworth is also first recorded in Domesday Book as 'Badesworde'. According to Ekwall's Oxford Dictionary of English Place Names this translates as 'Baeddi's wood,' with Baeddi being an early English personal name. If correct, this name crops up in a number of other places such as Badsey in Worcester, and Badsaddle in Northamptonshire. Recently many of Ekwall's conclusions about the meaning of early place names has been challenged from several academic sources, and it is possible that other meanings can be attributed. Locational surnames are usually 'from' names. That is to say names given to people after they had left their original homesteads to move somewhere else. As such the easiest identification was to call them by the name of their former village. Spelling being at best indifferent and local accents very thick, often lead to the creation of 'sounds like' spellings. In this case examples of recordings taken from surviving church registers include Ellen Badsworth of Featherstone in Yorkshire, on January 16th 1582, and Anne Bodworth who married Thomas Griffen at St Andrews by the Wardrobe, in the city of London, on January 26th 1589.