This unusual name is of Anglo-Saxon origin, and is a locational surname from either of the places called 'Cayton' in North and in West Yorkshire. The places are recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086 as, respectively, 'Caitune' and 'Chetune', and share the same meaning and derivation, which is 'Caega's tun', from the Olde English pre 7th Century personal name 'Caeg(a)', with 'tun', meaning 'homestead, settlement, or village'. Locational surnames were usually given to the Lord of the Manor, and especially to those former inhabitants who moved to another area. Alice Cayton was christened on the 28th March 1596 at Cockerham, in Lancashire, and Thoams Cayton married Elizabeth Simson on the 6th June 1603 at Cartmel, Lancashire. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Elsabeth Caton, which was dated 1279, The Cambridgeshire Hundred Rolls, during the reign of King Edward I, The Hammer of the Scots, 1272 - 1307. Surnames became necessary when governments introduced personal taxation. In England this was known as Poll Tax. Throughout the centuries, surnames in every country have continued to "develop" often leading to astonishing variants of the original spelling.

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