Hyde-Chambers

As with many Old English personal names such as "Alfgar", composed of the disparate elements "aelf", elf and "gari", spear, most double-barrelled names are the result of a marriage between two families, where the resulting name has no overall meaning, but the separate elements have their own meaning and derivation. In this instance, the name Hyde is topographical for someone living on, and farming, a place originally named as being a hide of land, from the Old English pre 7th Century "hi(g)d". This was quite a large amount, between sixty and a hundred and twenty acres, and seems from the etymology to have been originally fixed as the amount necessary to support one (extended) family. Chambers is an occupational name from the Old French "chambre", meaning a room in a house or a reception room in a palace. The name was originally applied to one employed in the private living quarters of his master, i.e., "an official of the bed chamber". Hyde is first recorded as Robert le Hider in 1309, in "Middle English surname" (1100 - 1300). Both surnames are very common in England. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Nicholas de Chambers, which was dated 1219, The London Pipe Rolls, during the reign of King Henry 111, "The Frenchman", 1216 - 1272. Surnames became necessary when governments introduced personal taxation. In England this was known as Poll Tax. Throughout the centuries, surnames in every country have continued to "develop" often leading to astonishing variants of the original spelling.