Pakeman

This unusual name has two possible origins. The first and most generally applicable is of early medieval English origin and is an occupational surname for a pedlar or hawker, someone who carried his pack of goods for sale with him. The derivation is from the Middle English "pake, packe", pack, bundle, with "man", man. The second possible origin is also an English medieval occupational name, but here for someone who was a servant of a person called "Pack", a medieval given name found particularly in Kent, and possibly deriving from a variant of "Pask", a name for someone born at Easter. The modern surname can be found as "Pakeman", or "Packman". Timothy Pakeman married Hannah Airay on May 17th 1692 at All Hallows, London Wall. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Simon Pakeman, which was dated 1202, The Norfolk Pipe Rolls, during the reign of King John known as "Lackland", 1199 - 1216. Surnames became necessary when governments introduced personal taxation. In England this was known as Poll Tax. Throughout the centuries, surnames in every country have continued to "develop" often leading to astonishing variants of the original spelling.