Toseland

This interesting and unusual surname is of English locational origin from a place thus called in the former county of Huntingdonshire, now part of Cambridgeshire. Recorded as Toleslund in the Domesday Book of 1086, and as Touleslund in the 1220, Fine Court Rolls of that county, the place was so called from the Old Swedish, Old Norse personal name Toli, plus the Old English "lund", from the Old Norse "ludr", grove or copse; hence, "Toli's grove". The surname, with variant spellings Towslance, Tosland, Tozeland, Toesland, Toasland, Toosland etc., is well recorded in church registers of south eastern England from the late 16th Century. On December 14th 1586, John Toseland, an infant, was christened in Stanwick, Northamptonshire, and on July 26th 1646, Aimee Toseland and Edward Russel were married in Dunton, Bedfordshire. The marriage of Mary Toseland and John Limage took place in Godmanchester, Huntingdonshire, on March 3rd 1717. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Alex Towslande, (marriage to Alice Elyet), which was dated April 27th 1572, Shillington, Bedfordshire, during the reign of Queen Elizabeth 1, "Good Queen Bess", 1558 - 1603. 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.