Family with Jewish connections in 16th century Wolston?

[maesyseren]

I am intrigued by this family - it seems to me that some of the names suggest a possible Jewish history?                                                                 
Roger Lissaman b. 1555
Isobel Milles b.1561

Children recorded at Wolston, Warwickshire:

Katherine Lissaman 1584
Elizabeth Lissaman 1586
Josiah Lissaman 1588
Liddia Lissaman 1591
Elvathan Lissaman 1594
Alice Lissaman 1598
Abraham Lissaman 1602
Elias Lissaman 1604

[GrahamSimons]

Seems unlikely - Jews were expelled from England in 1290 and there was no Jewish presence until at least the mid-17th century.

[jim1]

It's possible they were descendants of Jews but not Jewish themselves.Old Hebrew names were popular up to the 20th. C.
At this time in history being anything other than C of E would have been extremely dangerous.
Although it sounds foreign I believe it's Anglo-Scottish.

jim

[kateblogs]

There were Sephardic Jews in London prior to the mid-17th century, but they were mostly merchants from Portugal and would have kept their Jewishness very quiet. However, this family do seem to be English, the surname LISSAMAN certainly isn't Sephardic. Biblical names were quite fashionable, or they may have been non-Conformists.

[maesyseren]

Thank you for the replies, I was just thinking that what is said makes perfect sense, but then whilst rummaging for the surname on Google I came across this family tale which I was unaware of.  The two brothers I believe are said to be silversmiths.  Not sure what to make of it, maybe the family had no Jewish origins, but did arrive from Eastern Europe at some point.  I also read that the name had been found in old German records.  Brain full of question marks now, will sign off and ponder .......

'Some of my ancestors were LISSAMAN's from Wolston, Ryton-on-Dunsmore and elsewhere in Warwickshire. In the 1800's a lot of them were carpenters, joiners or involved in the building trade..................... The oral history handed down in the LISSAMAN family was that two brothers came to England from Eastern Europe. They may have been Jews. One settled in Birmingham and one in Coventry - these are the two places where most can now be found. The 1881 census for the Uk has only 209 LISSAMANs including, variants, and the 1901 has a similar number. LISSAMAN is not an English name. It looks like if the story is true then they came to England before 1700.'

http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?action=post2;start=0;board=38

[kateblogs]

LISSAMAN is an Anglo-Scots name http://www.surnamedb.com/Surname/Lissaman It's a variation of Leishman, a name I have in the Scots branch of my family - and they definitely were not Jewish.

Also, as in stated in my earlier post, the Jews who were in England at that time did not come from Eastern Europe, they were Sephardic and generally had Mediterranean names. (My own branch came from Italy and were called Todero before they Anglicised their name) Jews with northern European names who came from eastern Europe are Ashkenazi and they didn't emigrate here until the 18th/19th centuries.

I'm sorry if this isn't what you want to hear, but it would be a shame if you were searching down completely the wrong avenues.

[kateblogs]

Sorry this is OT but - maesyseren Just had a look at your previous posts and noticed you were asking about the name HERITAGE. I have Heritage ancestors, and yes, they were boat people  Don't recognise any of your names though, but mine came from Stratford and Birmingham.

[maesyseren]

I had a look at the surname distribution map for the 1891 census for the Lissaman surname, and it seems they do indeed live only in the Coventry and Birmingham areas, with the exception of a few in London and Kent. They don't appear anywhere else, which is curious - would have expected to see a presence in Scotland.

I was interested to hear of your Heritage ancestors, thank you for mentioning it, prompted me to have another look at my Heritage line - discovered that I had got part of it wrong, but also found a boatman .  Joseph Heritage was born at Kineton in 1781 (not 1771) and his parents were not Judah and Mary - they were Charles and Sarah Heritage, also from Kineton.  Josephs occupation is given as boatman on the baptism records of his children.  I think his wife Elizabeth Rayson b.1782 may have sadly died in childbirth as her burial at Bedworth in 1820 takes place on the same day as the baptism of her son William.  Williams burial is recorded a year later.  They had two other sons; Joseph b. 1813 (in my line) became a carpenter and Richard b.1816 became a boatman.  I have also found a baptism record for another son named Joseph born in 1811 and wonder if he died in infancy, but can find no further records of him.

I notice that Kineton is not far from Stratford so there may be a connection between our Heritage families.

[coombs]

In Essex I have found some Levi surnames. Like your Lissaman they may not have had Jewish ancestors but it was just an English surname variant of the Levi firstname.

I have Abel ancestors and doubt they were of Jewish origin but as said an English surname adopted from the Hebrew firstname.