This is a very confusing surname. It is recorded in a wide range of pellings including Anan, Annan, Anand, Annon, Hanan, Hannan, Hannon, Honeen, Honan, and Oonian, which can be either Irish or Scottish. However as Onion, Onions and Union it can be either Irish or English! The origination is either the ancient Gaelic O' hUainin, meaning the male descendant of the green (man), and probably a reference to a holy man who wore a green cloak or cassock, or it can be locational from the village of Annan in Dumfriesshire, Scotland. Union can either be a form of Hanan, Honeen etc, or it can be an English settler name, dating in Ireland from about 1640. If the latter, the derivation is the early English and Welsh personal name Einion, meaning just and virtuous. Examples of the surname recordings taken from surviving registers of England, Ireland and Scotland include William de Anand of Glasgow in 1255, James Union christened at St Mary Whitechapel in the city of London, on July 6th 1585, Christopher Hanan of Tallow, County Waterford, on March 12th 1797, and Andrew Annan given as being a tailor in Ayr in 1684. James Anan, a farmer, sailed on the ship Panthea of Liverpool, bound for New York on May 4th 1846. Surnames became necessary when governments introduced personal taxation. Throughout the centuries, surnames in every country have continued to "develop" often leading to astonishing variants of the original spelling.

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