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Rawsthorne is one of the thousands of new names that the Norman Conquest brought to England in 1066. The Rawsthorne family lived in Yorkshire, at Rostherne. Rawsthorn is derived from Old Norman names that mean red, and torn. Accordingly, the name means dweller by the thorns.
The surname Rawsthorne was first found in Yorkshire where they held a family seat as Lords of the manor of Fryston, and were conjecturally descended from Gerbodo, a Norman noble, who held those lands at the time of the taking of the Domesday Book in 1086, a census initiated by Duke William of Normandy after his conquest of England in 1066. This family emerged with several basic spellings, Rawson, which became popular in Yorkshire in all their various branches, Rawsthorne and Rawstorne and Rostron and Rawstorn all became more popular in Lancashire.
This web page shows only a small excerpt of our Rawsthorne research. Another 94 words (7 lines of text) covering the years 1683 and 1965 are included under the topic Early Rawsthorne History in all our PDF Extended History products and printed products wherever possible.
It is only in the last few hundred years that the English language has been standardized. For that reason, Anglo-Norman surnames like Rawsthorne are characterized by many spelling variations. Scribes and monks in the Middle Ages spelled names they sounded, so it is common to find several variations that refer to a single person. As the English language changed and incorporated elements of other European languages such as Norman French and Latin, even literate people regularly changed the spelling of their names. The variations of the name Rawsthorne include Rawstorne, Rawsthorne, Rawstorn, Rawstron, Rawstrone, Rawsthorn, Rostron and many more.
Outstanding amongst the family at this time was
Faced with the chaos present in England at that time, many English families looked towards the open frontiers of the New World with its opportunities to escape oppression and starvation. People migrated to North America, as well as Australia and Ireland in droves, paying exorbitant rates for passages in cramped, unsafe ships. Many of the settlers did not make the long passage alive, but those who did see the shores of North America were welcomed with great opportunity. Many of the families that came from England went on to make essential contributions to the emerging nations of Canada and the United States. Some of the first immigrants to cross the Atlantic and come to North America carried the name Rawsthorne, or a variant listed above: