This very unusual and rare surname is medieval English. It is may be occupational although we have been unable to find any job or skill to which it might apply, and the other alternative would seem to be that it is locational. If this is the case it describes a person who lived at or possibly was from, a place called Tign or similar. There does not seem to be such a place which leads us to suspect that we have a 'sounds like' surname spelling which was probably based upon Teign or Tyne. If so this surname would refer to a person who lived by one of the several rivers so called, and found throughout England. Locational surnames were amongst the earliest to be created. They were usually given either to the local lord of the manor and his descendants or to somebody who had left their original homestead to move somewhere else, and were most easily identified by this place name. Spelling at best being erratic and local dialects very thick often lead to the developement of variant forms. In this case the surname is recorded in the city of London since Elizabethan times. The first recording may be that of William Tigner who married Mary Bell at St Vedasts church, Foster Lane, on February 22nd 1598.

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