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This ancient name can be traced back to the villages of Great and Little Massingham in North Norfolk,

near the town of King's Lynn. It is well recorded in the surrounding villages of Field Dalling, Langham,

and in the county town of Norwich itself, suggesting that the nameholders, or at least many of them, do

derive from the original 13th century land owning family.

The name is tribal and probably Anglo-Saxon, and translates as the 'hamm' (place or village) of the

Maessa (Mass) tribe (ing). These people are also recorded in Lincoln, as 'Massingberd', the castle

(berg) of the Maessa tribe. The early recordings include Adam de Messingham in Lincoln in the

Hundred Rolls of that county for the year 1273, and John de Messingham in the London Rolls for the

same year. Thomas de Messyngham is recorded in the Poll Tax Rolls for the city of York in 1379, whilst

amongst the early church recordings is that of William Massingham who married Ursula Wade at

Fincham, Norfolk, on June 13th 1595.

Other examples of the recordings showing the surname development are those of William

Messengham, christened at Sharrington, Norfolk, on July 1st 1691, and Mary Massingham who

married Thomas Wilson at Norwich Cathedral, on October 14th 1701, in the reign of William of Orange

(1689 - 1702). The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Walter de

Massingham, which was dated 1272, in the Hundred Rolls of the county of Cambridge, during the reign

of King Edward 1, known as 'The Hammer of the Scots', 1272-1307. Surnames became necessary

when governments introduced personal taxation. In England this was known as the Poll tax.

 

acknowledgements

Greg Harper, Kathleen Bell,

David Williamson, Flick

Miller, Steve Buck, Michel

Vallat, Rochelle Mortimer,

Philip Steer, Veronica

Massingham, Jack Cockett

and Jenny Smith.

Information on this site is

intended to help family

historians, not to give offence

nor to provide misleading

data.

Data for living persons is

supressed. I am happy to

correct anything that is

wrong, and to remove data if

asked.