This surname has truly Olde English pre 10th century origins, and one which illustrates all the history of surnames. It is locational and descends for the word "snaed" or "snad" - both mean the same and describe a clearing made in a forest. The name is found locationally in the three Kent place names Snoad's Hole, Snoad's Farm, and Snoadhill. The variant forms include Snead, as in Snead Farm, Rock, Worcester, Sneyd, and Snee. The name was probably tribal in pre-Norman days, although it is an early Anglo Saxon surname, and one which clearly survived the 1066 Invasion when many early English forms were lost. A Coat of Arms was granted in 1611, and perhaps not surprisingly given the rural meaning of the name is a gold field, with three green acorns in pale between two black pales wavy. Early examples of the recordings include Robert del Sned and his wife Agnes Sned, of Worcester in the 1275 Subsidy Rolls, Robert atte Snede, also of Worcester in 1327, and John Snode of Suffolk in the same year. Later examples include Thomas Snoad, a witness at the church of St. Ann's Soho, London on April 18th 1693, and Edward Grover Snoad, who married Susanna Underwood at St Johns Church, Shoreditch, on January 18th 1861. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Ailnoth de Snode, which was dated 1214, in the Curia Regis Rolls of Kent, during the reign of King John, known as "Lackland" 1199 - 1214. 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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