Binner

This very uncommon name, perhaps more familiar in its variant forms Binne or Binner, is of Anglo-Saxon origin, and derives from the Olde English pre 7th Century "binn", manager, bin. The surname from this source has two possible interpretations; firstly, it may be an occupational name for a maker of bins, used for the storage of corn, meal, and bread, for instance. Thomas Binere, recorded in Colchester, Essex, in 1373, was a bin-maker. Job-descriptive surnames originally denoted the actual occupation of the namebearer, and gradually became hereditary. The second possible source of the modern surname is from a topographical name for someone who lived by or in a hollow place, so called from the transferred sense of the Olde English "binn", as before, or by an open manger or stall, from the original sense of the term. Topographical surnames were some of the earliest created, since both man-made and natural features in the landscape provided easily recognisable distinguishing names in the small communities of the Middle Ages. Examples of the surname from Church Registers include: the marriage of Agnes Byner and Lawrence Bridge in Halifax, Yorkshire, on May 19th 1549; the marriage of William Biner and Clements Cass or Cask on January 26th 1563, in Chelmsford, Essex; and the christening of Grace, daughter of Christofer Biner, in Bickleigh, Devonshire, on May 16th 1654. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Walter le Bynere, which was dated 1296, in the "Subsidy Rolls of Sussex", during the reign of King Edward 1, known as "The Hammer of the Scots", 1272 - 1307. 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.