This long-established surname is of Polish origin, and may either be an occupational name for a quarry-man or stone-cutter, deriving from the Polish "kamien", stone, with the addition of the suffix "-ski", or a locational name from any of the several places named with the Polish word "kamien", stone, for example, Kamieniec in Lower Silesia, plus the locational suffix "-ski". Job-descriptive surnames originally denoted the actual ccupation of the namebearer, and later became hereditary, and locational surnames were initially given to local landowners, and later as a means of identification to those who left their birthplace to settle elsewhere. In Polish surnames "-ski" originally indicated association with a place, but soon came to be regarded as equivalent to the French "de", and so indicative of gentry status. Formerly, the namebearer would have been lord of the estate or manor to which the name referred, but gradually "-ski" was applied indiscriminately to various surname types. In 1793, the birth of Ignacy, son of Jozef and Ewa Kaminski, was recorded at Slone, Bydgoskiego, Poland, and on February 4th 1801, Josephum Kaminski and Catharina Gajewska were married at Lodz, Lodzkiego, Poland. A Coat of Arms granted to the Kaminski family of Poland is recorded heraldically in Rietstap's "Armorial General", and depicts a silver hatchet, handled gold, on a red shield. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Gergor Kamensky, which was dated February 3rd 1685, marriage to Apolonia Bretsova, at Nebovidy, Brno, Czechoslovakia, during the reign of John 111, Sobieski, the last independent King of Poland, 1674 - 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.1697.

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