Lovetott History, Family Crest & Coats of Arms

The surname Lovetott was first found in Nottingham at Worksop, a market-town and parish, and the head of a union, in the Hatfield division of the wapentake of Bassetlaw. 2

"This place, which in Domesday Book is written Witchesope, and in other records of that period Wyrksoppe and Wirkensop, appears to have belonged, prior to the Conquest, to Elsi, a Saxon nobleman. It was afterwards granted by the Conqueror to Roger de Busli, and subsequently became the property of William de Lovetot, who, in the reign of Henry I., founded here a priory for Canons regular of the order of St. Augustine, the prior of which was, in the time of Henry III., summoned to parliament. After a considerable period, it passed, by the marriage of the heiress of the Lovetots, to the family of Furnival." 2

We do not how William De Louvetot, who had been a Huntingdonshire Baron, acquired his interest in Yorkshire; nor is there any certainty as to his genealogy; but he is conjectured to have been the son of Ricardus Surdus of Domesday, who was one of two great sub-feudatories of the Earl of Mortaine in this part of England. His coat of arms, Argent a lion rampant parti per fesse Gules and Sable, was allusive to his name Luve (cognate to the German Loewe) being Danish for lion." 3

"Not long after the Conquest, we find William de Lovetot possessed of Hallam, Attercliffe, Sheffield, and other places in Yorkshire, and we subsequently trace his family, for three generations, as feudal Lords of Hallamshire. Little attention has been paid by our genealogists to the origin of this potent house, but certain it is that its benign influence laid the foundation of the prosperity which that district of Yorkshire enjoys to this day. The feudal chieftain of the time of our early Norman Kings in his baronial hall, presents not at all times an object which can be contemplated with satisfaction by those who regard power but as a trust, to be administered for the general good. With authority little restricted by law or usage, he had the power of oppressing as well as benefiting the population by which he was surrounded, and many doubtless were the hearts which power so excessive seduced. It is gratifying when we find those who could overcome its seductive influence. And such seem to have been the family of De Lovetot." 4