Message: "Re: Balliol" - Behind the Name

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[Facts] Re: Balliol

by Cleveland Kent Evans (clevelandkentevans)

1/4/2010, 5:55 AM

Balliol is the surname of a Norman French family that settled in northern England and southern Scotland after the Norman conquest. The surname indicates that they came from Bailleul, a place in the province of Picardy in France. One of the oldest parts of Oxford University in England is Balliol College, named after this family.

http://www.crwflags.com/fotw/Flags/fr-59-ba.html

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/50655/Balliol-family

Perhaps the name was adopted because it resembles a name in the Rom language, but the "upper class" associations of the name probably also operated in making it seem like an interesting "English" name to adopt in Rom culture.

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- Sian (Sharley) +2

1/4/2010, 4:07 PM

So would I be correct in assuming the Rom simply picked it up from the surname?

I know Rom have been known to adopt names from the people of the places where they've settled or travelled though.

Also, the Norman conquest was the 1000s and the Rom I found using the name were traveling through Aberdeen, Scotland in early to mid 1500s so the name could have spread by that time, right?

This message was edited 1/4/2010, 4:15 PM

- poppylena +1

1/4/2010, 11:30 PM

John Balliol was a King of Scotland from 1292 to 1296:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Balliol

So it was known in Scotland.

- Sian (Sharley)

1/6/2010, 6:27 PM

Wow...how did I totally not know that?
Thanks!

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