This intriguing name is of early medieval English origin, and is from a metonymic occupational surname for a maker of nails or pins. The name derives from the Middle English (1200 - 1500) "tingle, tyngyl", a very small kind of nail, usually called a "tingle-nail", the word is thought to be of Low German origin. The modern surname from this source can be found recorded as Tingle or Tingler, the latter having the agent derivative suffix "-er", to indicate "a maker of tingles". Job-descriptive surnames originally denoted the actual occupation of the namebearer, and later became hereditary. The surname was first recorded in the early 13th Century (see below), and William Tingenail was recorded in the 1205 Curia Regis Rolls of Norfolk. In some few instances, the modern surname may derive from the use of "Tingle" as a nickname for a small, thin man, derived from the same element as the occupational name (above). The surname is found recorded most often in East Anglia: the marriage of John Tingle and Annis Gifforde was recorded at Knapwell in Cambridgeshire, on April 13th 1602. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Alan Tingel, which was dated 1209, in the "Pipe Rolls of Cambridgeshire", 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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