This most interesting and rare surname has two possible origins. Firstly, the name may be of Scottish locational origin from Scone, a parish and village in Perthshire, which probably derived from the Olde English "scene", meaning bright, beautiful; hence, a bright or beautiful place. This place was the capital of the Kingdom of the Picts and was for a long time the place where Scottish kings were crowned. King Malcolm 111 was crowned here in 1057 having slain Macbeth. However, there is also the chance that the surname may be an Anglicized form of the German Schon, which originated as a nickname for a handsome, pleasant, refined man, derived from the German word "schon", bright, fine, beautiful. The surname itself is first recorded in Scotland in the mid 13th Century (see below), while one Symone de Scone appears as the Abbot of Inchaffray in 1365, and Jonne de Scone was one of the masons who built St. Giles' Church, Edinburgh, in 1387. Radulphus Scoyne married Elizabeth Robinson on October 10th 1630, at Romaldkirk, Yorkshire. Catharina, daughter of William and Anna Scones, was christened on March 12th 1659, at Brilon, Westfalen (now Germany). The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Ysaac de Scone, a witness in Drumkarauch, which was dated 1260, in the "Priory Chartularium of St. Andrew's, Scotland", during the reign of King Alexander 111 of Scotland, 1249 - 1286. 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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