This rather unusual surname, is of Anglo-Saxon origin, and locational from Gore (Court) in Kent, or Gore in Wiltshire, both so called from the Olde English pre 7th Century "gara" meaning "gore" (a triangular piece of land). Locational surnames were usually acquired by a local landowner, or by the lord of the manor, and especially by those former inhabitants of a place who had moved to another area, and were thereafter best identified by the name of their birthplace. The surname is first recorded in the latter half of the 12th Century (see below), and further early recordings include: one Alan atte Gore, who appeared in the 1273 Hundred Rolls of Essex, and a William de Gora, listed in the Hundred Rolls of Wiltshire, dated 1274. The surname is particularly well recorded in Church Registers of Kent and Wiltshire from the mid 16th Century: two of the earliest entries being the marriage of Rychard Gore and Margaret Potkyn in All Saints, Maidstone, on May 4th 1544, and the christening of Joane Gore in Trowbridge, Wiltshire, on October 10th 1545. An illustrious namebearer was Sir John Gore (1772 - 1836), Knight Commander of the Bath (1815) and Vice - Admiral, 1825. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Ralph de la Gare, which was dated 1181, in the "Pipe Rolls of Kent", during the reign of King Henry 11, known as "The Builder of Churches", 1154 - 1189. 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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