Luscombe

This interesting and unusual name is of Anglo-Saxon origin, and is a locational surname from the county of Devonshire, specifically from any one of the five villages of this name called "Luscombe". The placename derives from the Olde English pre 7th Century words "hlose", meaning "pigsty", and "cumb", an originally Celtic word meaning a short, straight valley. Locational surnames were usually given to the local landowners and the Lord of the Manor, and especially to those former inhabitants who left their original homes to live or work in another area. The christening of Edward Luscombe was recorded at Ligborough in Devon on the 28th September 1541, and that of Dorothie Luscombe on the 18th June 1620 at St. Dunstan's, Stepney, in London. A notable bearer of the name was Michael Henry Thornhill Luscombe (1776 - 1846), M.A., Catherine Hall, Cambridge, 1805, and D.C.L., 1810, who was consecrated to a continental bishopric by the bishops of the Scottish episcopal church, and appointed embassy chaplain at Paris, 1825. The family Coat of Arms is a silver shield with a lion rampant guardant crowned gold, on an azure pile, the Crest being a demi lion rampant guardant crowned gold. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of John Luscombe, which was dated 28th April 1539, marriage to Margaret Fox, at Stoke Fleming, Devonshire, during the reign of King Henry V111, known as "Bluff King Hal", 1509 - 1547. 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.