The surname of ACRAMAN was an occupational name 'the Acreman' a ploughman, a tiller of the soil, a farmer. Most of the occupations or professions reflected in family names are those known in the small villages in Europe, or those followed in a king's or important noble's household, or in some large religious house or monastery. During the middle ages much of Europe was composed of small villages, and the occupations would be used to describe the bearer. The name was originally derived from the Old German AKERMANN, and was brought into England in the wake of the Norman Invasion of 1066, with William the Conqueror. Early records of the name mention Roger le Acreman, 1273, County Oxford. Alexander Acherman, County Huntingdonshire, ibid. Hugh Akerman of Yorkshire, was listed in the Yorkshire Poll Tax of 1379. John Sandford and Mary Ackerman were married at St. George's, Hanover Square, London in the year 1802. The name has many variant spellings which include ACKERMANN, AKERMAN and AKERMANN. Many factors contributed to the establishment of a surname system. For generations after the Norman Conquest of 1066 a very few dynasts and magnates passed on hereditary surnames, but the main of the population, with a wide choice of first-names out of Celtic, Old English, Norman and Latin, avoided ambiguity without the need for a second name. As society became more stabilized, there was property to leave in wills, the towns and villages grew and the labels that had served to distinguish a handful of folk in a friendly village were not adequate for a teeming slum where perhaps most of the householders were engaged in the same monotonous trade, so not even their occupations could distinguish them, and some first names were gaining a tiresome popularity, especially Thomas after 1170. The hereditary principle in surnames gained currency first in the South, and the poorer folk were slower to apply it. By the 14th century however, most of the population had acquired a second name. The associated coat of arms is recorded in Sir Bernard Burkes General Armory. Ulster King of Arms in 1884. Registered at London and Surrey. Granted to Isaac Akerman on 20th May 1761. |
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