This unusual and interesting name is of Anglo-Saxon or medieval English origin, and has two possible derivations. Firstly, it may be one of the surnames formed from either of the Olde English pre 7th Century personal names "Aethelgyth" or "Aethelgeat". The former was a popular female given name composed of the elements "aethel", noble, with "gyth", strife, combat; the latter a rare name not recorded before the Norman Conquest of 1066, lthough certainly in use later, composed of "aethel", noble, and "geat", a tribal name. It is no longer possible to distinguish the individual derivations of the modern surnames from this source, which range from Aylett, Aylott, I(l)lott, Allatt and Allett to Allitt, Alliott, Ellyatt and Eliot. The given names appear in the Domesday Book of 1086 as Adelid, Ailiet and Ailad (for Aethelgyth"), and as Ailet, Aliet and Eliet ("Aethelgeat"). Walter Aylet, Thomas Ailot and John Ayllyth are all recorded in the Cambridgeshire Hundred Rolls of 1279. The surname Ilott may also be a topographical name from residence on or by an islet, from the Middle English, Old French "islet, islete", little island, eyot. Hertfordshire Church Registers record the christening of John, son of Thomas Ilott, at Baldock, in March 1599, and the marriage of Francis Ilott and Joane Shattboutt, on October 20th 1672, at Hitchin. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of William Ilot, which was dated 1273, in the "Hundred Rolls of Suffolk, during the reign of King Edward 1, known as "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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