Date: [unknown] [unknown]
Location: [unknown]
Surnames/tags: Blood Bloud Blud

Contents 1 Origins of the Bloods: Surname Distribution in England, 1100 to 1750 1.1 Introduction 1.2 Principal Source 1.3 Caveat Indagator 1.4 The Oldest Records 1.5 The English Bloods from 1100 to 1350 1.6 The English Bloods from 1351 to 1500 1.7 The English Bloods from 1501 to 1650 1.8 The English Bloods from 1651 to 1750 1.9 Conclusions 1.10 Implications 1.11 Annex: The English Bloods in 1861 and 2016 1.12 Notes

Origins of the Bloods: Surname Distribution in England, 1100 to 1750

Author: Garry Michael Blood, 25 Nov 2022

Introduction

Where in England did the English Bloods originate and how and when did they spread across the country? Understanding this could provide us insights into the deep origins of the people who bore the surname in the Middle Ages. Of course, the question itself implies there was only one origin event for the name in England, but is that true? What does the historical evidence show? This paper will lay out the distribution of Blood in England in four eras: 1100 to 1350; 1351 to 1500; 1501 to 1650; and 1651 to 1750. From this we’ll see if we can draw any broad conclusions that might help better understand the origins and history of the English Bloods

Principal Source

This analysis relies on the of All Bloods in England to 1750, created and maintained by the author.

Caveat Indagator

It goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyway; when it comes to any historical research, we only know what the records show. Anything beyond that is a combination of assumption, inference, and logical reasoning. There’re probably many hundreds if not thousands of Bloods who lived before about 1540 for whom we have no records and never will. If these people didn’t end up in a deed, court record, tax roll, petition, or some other unique surviving document, they’re invisible to us. For that reason, we must be careful drawing conclusions that are too emphatic or ironclad with respect to the quantity and quality of the data at hand. For instance, the relatively large number of records of Bloods from 14th century Hereford might mean that Hereford really was a major centre of the Medieval Bloods, or it might only mean that more of Hereford’s 14th century records survived than is the case for cities where perhaps there were even larger numbers of Bloods. We just don't know for certain.

The Oldest Records

Here's an overview of the fourteen oldest records of anyone using Blood as either surname or byname through the end of the 13th century:

• William Blod was party to a sale and quitclaim of a property in Coventry, Warwickshire dated to sometime between 1129 and 1307. See footnote for why this might be the oldest record of the surname Blood in England.^[1]
• In 1220, Peter Blod is referenced as having previously donated a small farm near Tonbridge in Kent to the Priory of Tonbridge.^[2]
• Between 1230 and 1240, Peter Blod, son of Humphrey Blod, made a grant to the Priory of Tonbridge of a small farm "which lies to the right of the way which leads from Tunebrige to Winchelese." This is very likely the same Peter Blod referenced in the 1220 record.^[3]
• Also between 1230 and 1240, Robert Blod, son of Peter Blod, also made a grant to the Priory of Tonbridge in Kent, this time a monetary donation.^[4] These Tonbridge donation records are the first example we have of Blood (in its original form Blod) in use as a modern surname, in that it has clearly been inherited by two sons from their fathers. It is plausible we are even seeing three generations of Bloods here, Humphrey Blod> Peter Blod> Robert Blod. If that's the case, and given that Robert was an adult in the record dated to 1230-1240, then his grandfather Humphrey must've been born in the 11th century, likely no later than 1180 but probably a decade or two earlier.
• William Blod appears in a case recorded in the Assize Rolls of Northumberland in 1256. This is generally listed as the oldest example of the surname Blood in most derivative sources, but the 1220 Tunbridge record make that patently untrue.^[5]
• Agnes Blod, widow of Robert Blod, relinquished her rights to lands she owned in Pershore, Worcestershire to Pershore Abbey sometime between 1262 and 1274.^[6]
• John Blod, sergeant-at-arms, was mentioned in a royal order "witnessed by the king at Woodstock [Oxfordshire] the 20th day of December" in 1266.^[7][8]
• Robert and Thomas Blod witnessed a quitclaim in Canterbury, Kent sometime between 25 Mar 1268 and 24 Mar 1269.^[9]
• Gilbert Blod was mentioned in town records from Hereford, Herefordshire in 1281.^[10]
• Roger Blod was recorded as appearing before the Cheshire County Court on 9 Dec 1292.^[11]

While this doesn't seem like a lot, this is actually an impressive number of records from this period, considering that surnames barely existed among the English at all in the 13th century. Unless we've been incredibly lucky and recorded every Blood alive in the 13th century, these fourteen records are probably just a small percentage of the true number of people already using Blood as a surname at this time. This means Blood is one of the oldest true surnames in England, as opposed to topographic surnames such as "de Hastings" or descriptive surnames such as "le Blonde."

These records also show Blood was already functioning as we would expect of a surname right from its earliest appearances, i.e., these examples include no use of “le Blod,” “the Blod,” “alias Blod,” or “called Blod,” all phrasings that would point to it being a personal descriptor or byname instead of a fully functioning surname. The records from Kent dated to between 1220 and 1240 clearly show Blood operating as a modern surname and not simply a byname in that we have two examples of it passing unchanged from a father to a son. The example of Agnes Blod, widow of Robert Blod, tells us that Blood was functioning as a new family name taken by a bride upon marriage by 1274 at the latest, as it’s safe to infer Agnes received the name via her marriage to Robert.

The English Bloods from 1100 to 1350

After about 1300, Bloods show up in larger numbers in the record, primarily in southern England. Almost all the earliest surviving records of Bloods, including 11 of the 14 oldest records, lie in a narrow band from Hereford in the northwest to Canterbury in the southeast.

By 1350, the largest concentration of surviving Blood records is found in Hereford, with 23 records there. These 23 records refer to at least six and possibly seven distinct Blood men. Second is London with 17 records referring to at least four different Bloods. Third is Kent, with 13 records of Bloods, mainly in Tonbridge and Canterbury. Woodstock in Oxfordshire produced five records in reference to five Blood men, but this appears to be an artifact of the royal court being at Woodstock Palace from time to time during 13th and 14th centuries. It is uncertain where these Bloods were from, only that they had business at court.

Taken at face value (i.e., if we were confident these early records accurately reflected the actual disposition of Bloods in England at this time), the available data would appear to imply three contemporary areas of origin of the surname: Hereford, London, and somewhere in Kent, or possibly more than one place in Kent. But, as mentioned before and as we’ll see later, we can’t be certain this is an accurate reflection of the distribution of Bloods from 1100 to 1350.

The English Bloods from 1351 to 1500

In the next period records get even more sparse, and Bloods are found in only two main areas. The first is Hereford (still), by far the largest sample of records in this period at 34, but with 33 of them referring to the same man – John Blod, clerk of the Diocese of Hereford. This heavily skews the data in favour of Hereford when the Hereford Bloods may have been much reduced by then. For all we know, John Blod was the only man of that name left in the city. One woman, Cecily Blode, is named in a Hereford record of 1393.^[12] Cecily was also the last Blood recorded there until 1859. But the early extinction of the Hereford Bloods does not diminish the fact that they were once the largest concentration of English Bloods that we know of in the Medieval records.

In London we find 15 records of a mere four Bloods. Beyond that there are two records of two different Bloods in Sussex and a scattering of individual records marked by red crosses in the figure above. A person at the time could be forgiven for assuming the surname was well on its way to dying out based on its meagre representation in the records.

But we must also acknowledge the Y-DNA data, which points to a separate origination of the surname in the northern central English Midlands sometime between 1150 and about 1400^[13] and continuity of the male line from which the Bloods stemmed back to at least 600 CE in that area. The two northernmost red crosses in the figure represent two Bloods in Derbyshire in 1431 (the west one) and a Blood recorded in Nottingham in 1479 (the east one). Knowing as we do that south Derbyshire and south Nottinghamshire became the major concentration of Bloods in England in the next period and up to the present, this gives us a probable fourth area of origin in roughly the same timeframe as Hereford, London, and Kent. This points to multiple creations of the surname in different parts of England in the 13th and 14th centuries -- what we would expect to see if the name referred to something widely known and widely understood among the English of the time.

The English Bloods from 1501 to 1650

Things changed dramatically from the early 16th century onwards, as records reflect ever increasing numbers of Bloods. The main reason for this is an injunction issued in September 1538 during the reign of Henry VIII requiring the parishes of England and Wales to maintain records of all baptisms, marriages, and burials. So, while we probably have an arithmetic increase in the number of Bloods in England during this period, what we’re also seeing is the effect of this edict on the local parishes. Prior to this, parish officials rarely recorded such information for any parishioners other than perhaps the local gentry.

In this period we first detect the large south Derbyshire-South Nottinghamshire cluster, the large multi-coloured east-west oval above Birmingham in the figure here. In this cluster we have about 400 records referencing over 300 Bloods; several times the number for all of England in both previous periods combined. This strongly indicates there was an unrecorded cluster of Bloods here during the previous period of 1351 to 1500 that only became visible in the historical record due to the injunction of 1538. As discussed previously, the Y-DNA evidence indicates the Midlands occurrence of the surname Blood probably came into existence before 1400 and was first documented in 1431.

It’s difficult to understate the importance of the south Derbyshire-south Nottinghamshire cluster in the story of the English Bloods. This cluster was still the main concentration of Bloods in the mid-19th century, just as it continues to be in the early 21st century (see Annex). All known English-origin lines of Bloods in North America descend from members of this cluster. The Irish Bloods of County Clare are now proven, through Y-DNA evidence, to have originated here as well. Bloods of this cluster are also found in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and possibly South Africa.

There’s also a new cluster of Bloods in Buckinghamshire in this period -- in the figure it’s the second-largest oval, lying between the Derbyshire-Nottinghamshire cluster and London. Here we find 86 records of at least 70 Bloods appearing, predictably, in 1539 with the change in the law. Like in the south Derbyshire-south Nottinghamshire cluster, this indicates there may have been a substantial but invisible branch of Bloods already settled in the county before 1539. A single record from Buckinghamshire, of Thomas Bloode in 1475, indicates this could be the case and this presence may date to the 15th century or earlier. Most of these Buckinghamshire Bloods (79%) were in a 10-mile-long corridor running north-south through modern Milton Keynes in which we find the villages of Ravenstone, Newport Pagnell, Woolstone, and Wavendon. A majority of the Buckinghamshire Bloods in this period (55%) are found just in the village of Woolstone. Given that this cluster is quite separate from the surrounding clusters, and given how many Bloods there already were in this part of Buckinghamshire when parish records began, this appears to be another point of independent origin of the name. However, more focused research would be required to clarify that.

Finally, we have the London cluster where we find 42 records of at least 35 Blood individuals, although this possibly masks what may have been a complete extinction of the Bloods of London for a period of over two centuries. See The Bloods of Greater London for more specifics on London in this period.

The English Bloods from 1651 to 1750

In the period from 1651 to 1750, better and more extensive recordkeeping combined with better health among the English population led to not only more people, but also better documentation of those people. This manifests itself in the heatmap below, which shows a substantial increase in records of Bloods across the country. However, the story established in the 1500s continues -- the main concentration of English Bloods is in the Midlands region encompassing south Derbyshire, south Nottinghamshire, and adjacent areas of Staffordshire and Leicestershire. A new cluster has appeared in Lincolnshire, almost on The Wash; whether this is a colonisation from the Derbyshire-Nottinghamshire cluster or a local origination of the name has not been determined. Further south, the Buckinghamshire cluster still exists and the London Bloods have expanded significantly.

Conclusions

The period 1100 to 1350 gives us little data to go by, but from what we have it appears there were at least three distinct Blood originations in this period, in Hereford, in London, and in either one or two places in Kent. Our outliers, William Blod in Northumberland in 1256 William Blod in Warwickshire perhaps a bit earlier, and Roger Blod in Cheshire in 1292 could be the tips of three icebergs of large Blood populations in those areas for which records have not survived, or they could be one-off adopters of a name that died with them. We just don't know. However, the fact that Bloods don't reappear in any of these three counties until well into the modern period indicates we're probably not missing any significant populations in these areas.

The period 1351 to 1500 only gets worse, with even less evidence available. Based on the records at least, it appears Bloods only persisted in any numbers in Hereford and London, but as we’ve already seen in Hereford, there it was almost entirely due to one Blood who was a church official. The first records of Bloods in Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire appear in this period, and we can be reasonably confident these men really were the tip of the iceberg of the previously invisible Midlands Bloods.

The period 1501 to 1650 solidifies the large south Derbyshire-south Nottinghamshire cluster as the main centre of Bloods in England from then to the present. We can be confident in counting this cluster as a separate point of origin of the surname given Y-DNA evidence showing continuity of the male line from which those Bloods originated goes back to at least 600 CE in the same area.

From this, we can cautiously conclude that the surname Blood likely originated independently in Kent, Herefordshire, Westminster & London, and Derbyshire within a period of about 250 years between 1170 and 1420. Possible additional independent origin events may have occurred in Warwickshire, Buckinghamshire, and Lincolnshire, probably in the late Medieval period.

Establishing that the surname Blood originated in either four or five different places in England in roughly the same time period gives us our third criterion by which to evaluate any hypothesis concerning the origin of the surname Blood: The meaning of the surname must have been such that several unrelated families in different parts of England would have had reason to adopt it in the 250-year period from about 1170 to about 1420.

Implications

If this conclusion is correct, then it follows that these various geographically distinct lines of English Bloods were not and are not related to each other. Current Y-DNA testing has only involved Blood whose ancestors originated in the Midlands Cluster. Testing of Bloods who trace back to these other places of origin in England would help shed more light on the deep origins of the English Bloods.

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Annex: The English Bloods in 1861 and 2016

From at least the mid-1500s until the 1861 census, the main concentration of Bloods in England was in the south Derbyshire-south Nottinghamshire cluster. Between 1861 and 1881 there was an extension of this cluster northwards to Manchester concurrent with a sizeable increase in the London cluster. Both developments can be accounted for by the increased availability of manufacturing jobs in and around these two cities at the height of the industrialization of England.

Distribution of Bloods in the 1861 UK Census

Distribution of Bloods from a 2016 Survey

Notes

1. ↑ This document is undated, but the distinctive spelling of Coventry as Covintre places the date sometime between the beginning of the earldom of Ranulph II of Chester in 1129 and the end of the reign of King Edward II in 1307. Even a 1307 date would make it one of the oldest examples of the surname Blood, but if it's from any time in the first 90 years of that range (up to 1219, or 50.5% of the range) then it's older than the 1220 Kent record. Therefore, based on pure probability, there's about a 50/50 chance that this is the oldest surviving record.
2. ↑ A catalogue of medieval and early modern charters, related documents, and seals at the Bodleian Libraries, MS. Ch. Kent. 11, online at https://charters.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/catalog/charter_113359
3. ↑ A catalogue of medieval and early modern charters, related documents, and seals at the Bodleian Libraries, MS. Ch. Kent. 40, online at https://charters.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/catalog/charter_113365
4. ↑ A catalogue of medieval and early modern charters, related documents, and seals at the Bodleian Libraries, MS. Ch. Kent. 39, online at https://charters.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/catalog/charter_113364
5. ↑ Reaney & Wilson, A Dictionary of English Surnames, p.50; available online at the Internet Archive, https://archive.org/details/dictionaryofengl0000rean/page/50/mode/2up?q=Blod
6. ↑ UK National Archives, document reference E 210/3581
7. ↑ Calendar of Close Rolls, Henry III: Volume 13, 1264-1268, p.275, available online at British History Online, https://www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-close-rolls/hen3/vol13/pp272-279
8. ↑ Calendar of Close Rolls, Henry III: Volume 13, 1264-1268, pp.568-578, available online at British History Online, https://www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-close-rolls/hen3/vol13/pp568-578
9. ↑ UK National Archives, document reference CCA-DCc-ChAnt/H/105
10. ↑ The Manuscripts of Rye and Hereford Corporations, Etc. Thirteenth Report, Appendix: Part IV, pp.292-302, available online at British History Online, https://www.british-history.ac.uk/hist-mss-comm/vol31/pt4/pp292-302
11. ↑ The Cheshire Plea Rolls, 1259 to 1310, Chester County Court, Tuesday, 9 Dec 1292, entry 93. Online at https://cheshireplearolls.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/7_2.pdf
12. ↑ UK National Archives, Document Reference C 146/4657
13. ↑ Reasoning: A male who would eventually give rise to two genetically differentiated lines of Hydes and the original line of Midlands Bloods split off from the main trunk of haplogroup R-A6093 in the North Mercia region in about 1150 (i.e., very roughly his year of birth). It’s clear this man had not yet adopted a surname or all his descendants would have the same one, or at least a variation of it. But Hyde and Blood are not variants of each other. One line of that man’s descendants must have adopted the surname Blood sometime before about 1400 when the Nottinghamshire Bloods split genetically from the Derbyshire Bloods, because closely related study participants today bear the same Blood surname even though some trace back to the Derbyshire line and some to the Nottinghamshire line.