Winger

This interesting name is not as may be thought, a description of a sporting person, it is a direct descendant of the Olde English pre 7th Century personal compound name "Wine-gar" which translates as "Friend-Spear". The name was origianlly found in East Anglia where it is a now "lost" village name and it is also found in the Derbyshire village "Wingerworth" - near Chesterfield. The name development has included Winger (as a personal name) of Bury St. Edmunds in 1182 and William Wyneger in the Rolls of Suffolk for 1327. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Henry Wyngar. which was dated 1251, The Abbey of Ramsey, Huntingdonshire. during the reign of King Henry III, 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.