Weymouth

Recorded in various spellings including Waymond, Waymont, Weyment, Weymond, Weymonth and Weymouth, this is an English surname. It is clearly locational and the spellings would suggest that it originates from the Dorset town of Weymouth, meaning the place at the mouth of the River Wey. Weymouth is recorded as Waymouthe as early as the year 738 in the famous Anglo-Saxon Chronicles and five hundred years later as Weymuthe in the Patent Rolls of 1258. The surname being locational is a "from" name. That is to say a name given to somebody for easy identification, after they had left their original home to move somewhere else. Spelling over the centuries being at best erratic, and local dialects very thick, soon lead to the development of "sounds like" spellings. In this case Hugh Weymouthe appears in the register of the students of Oxford University in the year 1572. Early recordings in the surviving church registers of the diocese of Greater London include those of Amey Weymond, the daughter of John Weymond, who was christened at St Andrews Holborn, on February 6th 1680, Thomas Waymond, christened at St Margaret Pattens on October 20th 1783, and Mary Waymont, who married the exotically named Orange Fisher at the church of St John, the Evangelist, Notting Hill Gate, on May 16th 1861.