Wedge

This interesting and unusual surname, with variant spelling Wegg, Wege and Wegge, is of Anglo-Saxon origin, and may derive from two possible origins. Firstly, it may be of topographical origin, describing someone who lived on a wedge-shaped (i.e. triangular) piece of land from the Olde English pre 7th Century word "wecg" and Middle English word "wegge", meaning wedge. The name may however also derive from the Olde English word "wice", a wych elm, hence "a dweller by a wych elm wood". The surname first appears in the early 14th Century (see below). Willelmus Wege was recorded in the Poll Tax Records of Yorkshire in 1379. The London Church Registers record the following entries: Robert Wedgte married Dorothie Wilson at St. Dunstan's, Stepney, on September 10th 1572, Agnes Wedge married Richard Bignum at St. Mary the Virgin, Aldermanbury on October 21st 1567. On June 25th 1626, one Mary Weedge was christened at St. Thomas Dudley in Worcester. John Helder Wedge (1792 - 1872) was a government surveyor in Tasmania in 1827, and then explored a large part of Tasmania, after which he became a land speculator at Port Philip and was a member of the Tasmanian Legislature. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of John Wegge, which was dated 1328, in "Kirby's Quest for Somerset", during the reign of King Edward 111, known as "The Father of the Navy", 1327 - 1377. 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.