History does funny things to names, Jellyman is a good example. The name has nothing to do with "jelly", it is a corruption of the Olde French "Guillemin" which itself is a derivative of Guillaume or William - the personal names. Normally, a name ending in "man" would imply "servant of", but in this case "man" is simply a dialectual transposition. There are an extraordinary number and types of variants including Gillman, Guillerman, Jellman, Jelliman, Jellyman, Welman, Williman, Willimont etc., the first recording as a baptisimal name being Gilmyn of Cambridge (1275 the Hundred Rolls) The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Matilda Ghylemyn which was dated 1297, in the "Pipe Rolls of Cornwall" 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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