Recorded in several forms including Spargae, Spargie, Spargon, all of which are either very rare or possibly even extinct, and the popular Spargo, this is an English surname, but one from the principality and county of Cornwall. Like many Cornish surnames, but unlike other Celtic-Breton-Gaelic surnames, it is locational, and originates from the village of Spargo, in the parish of Stithians. According to the authority of the book of Cornish Surnames, the original spelling in the 14th century was 'Spergour', and the meaning is the place covered by thorns or similar. Locational surnames generally in Europe are 'from' names. That is to say names given to people either because they were the descendants of the local lord of the manor, or more likely because they had moved somewhere else, and were best identified by the name of their former home. Spelling over the centuries being at best erratic, and local dialects very thick, often lead to the development of 'sounds like' forms. In the Cornish region neither of these applied. It just seems to have been accepted that if you lived at a certain place, you were called after that place, even though everybody else was as well! Early examples include John Spargo, whose daughter Sisily was christened at St Just in Penwith, on May 18th 1630, and Michael Spargo, a christening witness at Feock, on October 21st 1690.

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