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An ancient Strathclyde-Briton family from the Scottish/English Borderlands were the first to use the name Attkinhead. They lived in a barony in Lanarkshire where one of the first records was dates to 1372, when Robert II granted the lands of "Akynheuide" in Lanark to John de Maxwell in 1372. Convallus de Akinhead was recorded as witness to another land grant in the same year. 1
This web page shows only a small excerpt of our Attkinhead research. Another 218 words (16 lines of text) covering the years 1296, 1376, 1444, 1489, 1673, 1676, 1697 and 1699 are included under the topic Early Attkinhead History in all our PDF Extended History products and printed products wherever possible.
Before the printing press standardized spelling in the last few hundred years, no general rules existed in the English language. Spelling variations in Scottish names from the Middle Ages are common even within a single document. Attkinhead has been spelled Aikenhead, Akenhead, Akynhead, Akynheued, Aikkenhead, Achenhead and many more.
Notable amongst the family at this time was Thomas Aikenhead (c.1676-1697), a Scottish student from Edinburgh who was prosecuted and executed at the age of 20 on a charge of blasphemy; he was the last person in Britain to be executed for that charge. He was the son of an apothecary at Edinburgh and was described as 'not vicious and extremely studious.' "His religious opinions became unsettled by the perusal of 'some atheistical writers,'...
Another 73 words (5 lines of text) are included under the topic Early Attkinhead Notables in all our PDF Extended History products and printed products wherever possible.
For Scottish immigrants, the great expense of travel to North America did not seem such a problem in those unstable times. Acres of land awaited them and many got the chance to fight for their freedom in the American War of Independence. These Scots and their ancestors went on to play important roles in the forging of the great nations of the United States and Canada. Among them: Elizabeth Achenhed who settled in Jamaica in 1774.