Pudsey

This interesting and unusual name is of Anglo-Saxon origin, and is a locational surname deriving from the place called Pudsey, near Leeds, in Yorkshire. The place is recorded in the Domesday Book, of 1086 as "Podechesaie", and as "Pudekeshee" in the Yorkshire Feet of Fines for 1203. The name means "Pudoc's island or river land", derived from the Old English pre 7th Century personal name or byname "Pudoc", with the Old English "eg, ieg", island, piece of firm land in a fen, or land situated on a stream or between streams. The name "pudoc" may be a diminutive form of the personal name "Puda", or from the Old English "pudoc", wen, wart, used as a nickname. Locational names were mostly acquired by those who had moved to another area, and were best identified by the name of their birthplace. The marriage of Edward Pudsey and Edith Faban was recorded at St. Andrew by the Wardrobe, London, on February 15th 1605. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Willelmus de Puddesay, which was dated 1379, The Yorkshire Poll Tax Records, during the reign of King Richard 11, "Richard of Bordeaux", 1377 - 1399. 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.