Hello ,
I wonder if anyone can help or have any knowledge of the surname BLEWIS aka LEWIS - particularly in the era 1600 - 1750 ?
I'm aware of the book "Welsh Surnames" by TJ & P Morgan which comments -
"...the surname Lewis was in use before the patronymic system was discontinued - it is difficult to understand why "ab-Lewis" did not result in a surname - "Blewis" ."
I find this observation intriguing as i'm researching my LEWIS family back to Lydbury North in Shropshire - where a Richard Lewis md Anne Ambler in 1712 .
I have found 4 children bn to this couple -
Brian 1713
Frances 1715
Littleton 1717
Mary 1719
But the odd thing is that the surname recorded for the 2nd & 3rd baptisms was written as "BLEWIS " and not Lewis.
I had assumed this was perhaps done in error as never hearing of this name before but further research has shown a small cluster of "Blewis's" in this era , mainly in close proximity in New Radnor near the border with Herefordshire where there appears to be a few baptisms of the same Radnor family of a Hugh & Martha BLEWIS in Kington Hereford - likewise this is close to Lydbury in Shropshire .
In the Morgan's book they noted only a very few examples of the name Blewis further to the above quote and it seems to me that there actually were ( though not many ) more instances of this surname in this era and more in later years .
Would anybody have any thoughts on this naming issue - it seems very logical that the name would have evolved from "ab Lewis" but suffice to say i have yet to work out whether my Richard was actually a Lewis or a Blewis .
Although i understand that the name Lewis evolved from Llewelyn & variants.
Incidentally , the name Littleton /Lyttleton is significant and repe ats in the family line , so it seems highly likely there is a connection somewhere to a branch of the family of that name .
Richard 's wife Anne Ambler was the daughter of Rev Brian Ambler the vicar of Lydbury North who has connections to sites in Mongomeryshire , but i've found no Littleton link to the Ambler family .
I wonder if this kind of confusion between BLEWIS & LEWIS has been found by any other researchers at any time ?
Sorry for the length of this post , but if you can help have any thoughts or advice on this i would greatly appreciate it .
Kind regards