Kirkman Origins

KIRKMAN ORIGINS

The Oxford Dictionary of English Surnames has this on our surname:

Kirkman, Kirman, Kerman: Robert Kirkeman 1230 [source Pipe Rolls, Yorkshire]; Roger le Kirkeman 1259 [source Cavalry Charters, Yorkshire].Old Norse kirkja and Middle English man. ‘Custodian of a church’.

It is interesting that Oxford decided to include Kirman and Kerman as derivatives of Kirkman. It is not uncommon that surnames evolve by omitting a letter, but that would imply that the derivatives came later. Here, there is another possible derivation.

In Lincolnshire, there is a village called Kirmond Le Mire, some 20 miles north-east of Lincoln. Turning to Oxford’s Dictionary of Place Names:

Kirmond-le_mire A French name probably transferred from France where Chevremont and Quevremont also occurs. The name means Goat Hill. The Latinised form (de) Caprimonte occurs as a personal name (de) Capramonte Hyo Gilb. The place is in a valley among hills. Mire refers to “wet ground.” So this could also be the origin of the Kirman/Kerman variant.

Derby, Lincoln and Stamford). Added to the Norse origins of Kirk, that could make us Vikings.

The word Kirk also has its counterparts of Kirche in Germany, Kirkke in Danish and Kirk in Scotland (although the latter did not seem to be adopted until the mid seventeenth century). These could lead back to Celtic origins.

There is a preponderance of the Kirman/Kerman variant in Lincolnshire, but so is of the Kirkman surname! But elsewhere in England, the variants are seen much less. This case illustrates a point made by George Redmonds in “Surnames in Genealogy”: that all surnames are unique and it may even happen that the same one may have developed from a different root in one locality than in another.

And it was to the Lincolnshire coast that the Vikings came in their raids from the 8th to 11th century. Their longboats glided onto the flat sandy shore and the peaceful inhabitants could do little to stay their fierce onslaught. Burning and pillaging, they took their booty and sailed away but, in the ninth century, they were back with a great army and this time they came to stay. Eventually they integrated with the resident Anglo-Saxons and Lincolnshire became part of the Danelaw (the land ruled by the Danes) centred around the Five Towns (Nottingham, Leicester,

So if you want to find out which line you come from, a DNA test could help!