« Reply #16 on: Sunday 22 August 21 12:39 BST (UK) »
Many thanks guys. An interesting topic.
Cannot locate the google books Grays Inn publication - will keep trying. Came across this though, a paper the leather industry which confirms the newly created leather excise was still around - and unloved - in 1716. Also it appears Thorne in Yorkshire had a thriving tanning industry - see accounts of the Steers family which go back to Richard II.
https://www.bahs.org.uk/AGHR/ARTICLES/14n1a2.pdf
Steers is a very apt name for their occupation or breeding and raising young male calves before selling them on :-
"
Steer, also called bullock, young neutered male cattle primarily raised for beef. In the terminology used to describe the sex and age of cattle, the male is first a bull calf and if left intact becomes a bull; if castrated he becomes a steer and about two or three years grows to an ox."
Aberdeen: Findlay-Shirras,McCarthy: MidLothian: Mason,Telford,Darling,Cruikshanks,Bennett,Sime, Bell: Lanarks:Crum, Brown, MacKenzie,Cameron, Glen, Millar; Ross: Urray:Mackenzie: Moray: Findlay; Marshall/Marischell: Perthshire: Brown Ferguson: Wales: McCarthy, Thomas: England: Almond, Askin, Dodson, Well(es). Harrison, Maw, McCarthy, Munford, Pye, Shearing, Smith, Smythe, Speight, Strike, Wallis/Wallace, Ward, Wells;Germany: Flamme,Ehlers, Bielstein, Germer, Mohlm, Reupke