Blakeney
A habitational surname from places in England, especially Blakeney in Norfolk, meaning a person who came from that locality.
The #8,070 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 75,175 Americans shares it.
Etymology
Blakeney is a place-name surname taken from one of several English localities called Blakeney, especially the parish in Norfolk. The older sources connect it with Old English place-name elements, though nineteenth-century writers sometimes disagreed over the exact sense of the first element. In practice, it is safest to treat the surname as meaning simply “from Blakeney,” with the place-name itself probably referring to a dark or bleak-looking island, marsh, or shoreland area.
History
The surname is recorded early in England and appears in medieval documentary forms such as Johannes Blaankeney in 1379. Lower specifically associated the name with Blakeney in Norfolk, where one family held considerable property, and noted an Irish branch said to descend from a younger line settled there in Elizabethan times. The name later spread beyond Britain through migration.
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Fun fact
Blakeney is one of those surnames that can point to more than one English place, which is why historical writers occasionally listed several candidate origins.
From the historical record
“ley. BLAKENEY. A parish of Norfolk, in which CO. the family had great possessions. The B.'s of Ireland, settled there temp. Eliz., were a younger line. BLAKER. BLACKER. Cotgrave de- fines a blaclur as noirehsseur. The hitter word he Englishes by " blacker, blackener, lleacke?;" &c., tlius confounding two op- posite…”
— Patronymica Britannica: a dictionary of the family names of the United Kingdom