Bankhead
A surname most likely from a place-name or topographic term meaning “bank’s head” or the head of a slope or embankment.
The #9,210 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 87,216 Americans shares it.
Etymology
Bankhead is best understood as a compound of Old English bank, meaning a bank, ridge, or slope, and head, meaning the top or end of something. Taken literally, it would describe someone who lived at the top of a bank or near the head of a ridge, or else who came from a place so named. The surname has the look of an English or Scots locational surname, though the surviving excerpts do not provide a direct dictionary entry for it.
History
The excerpts supplied only mention the name in passing, so they do not establish a specific first homeland or family line. In practice, surnames of this type are often found in both England and Scotland, where topographic names were readily adopted as hereditary surnames. Bankhead also survives as a place-name in parts of Britain, which strengthens the locational reading.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Topographic surnames like Bankhead often began as simple directions, essentially telling neighbors where a family lived.
From the historical record
“Datk, his son, i6oa : ibid. Davie Bankhead, i6oa : ibid. I5a6. John Davyson and Blis. Bella : Marriage Lie (London), i. <. 1579. Baried—Davy op Bevan,”
— A Dictionary of English and Welsh Surnames (alternate scan)