As with many Old English personal names such as "Alfgar", composed of the disparate elements "aelf", elf, and "gari", spear, most double-barrelled names are the result of a marriage between two families, where the resulting name has no overall meaning, but the separate elements have their own meaning and derivation. In this instance, the name Standish is of Anglo-Saxon origin and a locational name from either of two places so called, in Gloucestershire and Lancashire. The derivation is from the Old English pre 7th Century words "stan", stone, and "edisc", enclosed pasture or park, the placename therefore meaning stony pasture. The surname Brooks is the genitive variant (i.e. of the brook) of the name Brook, itself a late medieval English development of the Old English pre 7th Century "broc", and the Old French "broc", the latter introduced into England after the Norman Invasion of 1066, and used in the sense of a stream or water. One Mathew Brooks married Joan Do, on August 23rd 1614 at St. Andrew's, Enfield. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Ralph de Stanedis, which was dated 1206, The Curia Rolls of Lancashire, during the reign of King John, known as "Lackland", 1199 - 1216. 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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