The Myring Origin Story

I’ve always been rather ambivalent about my surname – it wasn’t a great asset for the rigours of the playground – but I’ve always wondered about its origins.

During my family’s first phase of family tree research we came across the theory that ‘Myring’ was Dutch in origin, possibly being brought to the UK when Dutchmen led by Cornelius Vermuyden were employed to drain The Fens in the 1650s. The name Myring, it was rumoured, meant ‘bog dweller’. This failed to endear me to the name, but did further arouse my curiosity.

I think I have now unpicked this myth, and in the process – as has often been the case in my research – come across equally interesting possibilities.

‘Meyrink’ (or Meyerink, Meijerink, Meijering(h), Meyerinck) is indeed a Germanic name found in the Netherlands, and early example being the Dutch landscape painter Albert Meijeringh (1645-1714). The name means ‘from the estate of the meier’, ‘meier’ being the historical name for a bailiff in parts of the Low Countries.

So where did the idea that Myring means ‘bog dweller’ come from? I may have found the answer in an unlikely place – an Old English poem (first found in a 10th century collection) called the Widsith.

The Widsith tells of a people of Saxon origin called the Myrgings who lived in Schleswig and Holstein (on the modern German-Danish border in the Jutland peninsula) in the 5^th century before the Anglo-Saxon migration to Britain. According to the etymologist Kemp Malone[i], ‘Myrging’ means ‘mire-dweller’ or ‘mire-district dweller’, i.e. they lived in a marshy habitat.

I suspect that the Dutch name ‘Meyrink’ and the Saxon ‘Myrgings’ at some point became mistakenly conflated to form the theory that I heard in my youth. However, Kemp Malone does suggest something particularly interesting in his brief paper on the Myrgings:

According to the Widsith, the Myrgings were defeated in the mid-5th century by Offa, King of the Angles, and were then largely confined in Holstein south of the Eider River. However, a sub-group of the Myrgings (known as the ‘With-Myrgings’ due to their dwellings on the Vidå river) remained in western Schleswig. Malone argues that Offa’s victory over the Myrgings led to the With-Myrgings being assimilated by the Angles, and subsequently travelling with the Angles to settle England as part of the Anglo-Saxon migration during the 5th-7th centuries. Further, Malone notes that the Angle migration would not have occurred without their occupation of the With-Myrgings territory on the west coast of the peninsular. Interestingly, the Angles settled mainly in what would become Lincolnshire, East Anglia and the East Midlands.

Why is that interesting? Because, as we will see, it is precisely that area of England where we first find people with variants of the surname Myring.

The latest (2016) edition of the Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland suggests that ‘Myring’ is a variation of the name ‘Merrin’ (along with Mearing, Meering, Merren, Merring and Merron). They argue that it is a locative name (i.e one first given to people living in a certain place) originating in Mareham le Fen and Mareham on the Hill in Lincolnshire (recorded as ‘Maring’ in the year 1202), or alternatively from Meering in Nottinghamshire.

The Oxford Dictionary also lists a number of ‘early bearers’ of these name variations, and where they are found:

• John de Meryng, 1327 in Patent Rolls (Notts);
• Richard de Maryng, 1348 in Patent Rolls (Spilsby, Lincs);
• Alexander Meryng', 1374 in Feet of Fines (Radcliffe on Trent, Notts);
• Thomas Maryng, 1378 in Patent Rolls (Louth, Lincs);
• Roberto de Maryng', 1379 in Poll Tax (Louth, Lincs);
• Roberto Meryng, 1379 in Poll Tax (Long Whatton, Leics);
• Francis de Meryng, 1400 in Patent Rolls (Derbys);
• William Meryng', 1458 in Feet of Fines (Herts);
• John Meryng, 1476 in Feet of Fines (Shrops);
• Thomas Meryng', 1480 in Feet of Fines (Newark on Trent, Notts);
• Joahn Maringe, 1563 in IGI (Belleau and Aby, Lincs);
• Ann Mearing, 1567 in IGI (Crowle, Lincs);
• Emmota Mearinge, 1582 in IGI (Whitgift, WR Yorks);
• Alice Mering, 1587 in IGI (Worksop, Notts);
• Alce Merin, 1587 in IGI (Whaplode, Lincs);
• Brigget Meringe, 1588 in IGI (Doddinton, Lincs);
• Elizabeth Mearinge, 1610 in IGI (South Collingham, Notts);
• John Myring, 1628 in IGI (Sheepy Magna, Leics);
• Mary Mearing, 1631 in IGI (Sutton on Trent, Notts);
• Hanah Meerin, 1699, Henry Meering, 1701, Jeane Mearin, 1724, George
• Mearing, 1729 in IGI (Shinfield, Berks);
• Elizabeth Merrin, 1703 in IGI (Derby, Derbys)

We can see that the Myrings do appear to originate in lands settled by the Angles, and it is tempting to make speculative leaps. Yet it seems to me that the Oxford Dictionary’s explanation is the more prosaic one, and that the Myrings originated in towns like Mareham-le-Fen which were doubtless named after their proximity to ‘mires’ in Eastern England rather than mires in the Jutland peninsular.

Other than the location of these towns being in lands settled by the Angles there is no evidence to link their names - or the names of their residents - to the Myrgings who may have settled the area six or seven centuries before the first ‘Myring’ pops up in historical records. Still, it is a romantic thought, and would be a link to the Anglo-Saxon era that precedes even that of the Arden family.

It is also notable that the early Myrings provided by the Oxford Dictionary appear three centuries before the Dutch involvement in the draining of the Fens, so we can perhaps dismiss the Dutch origin theory too.

You’ll note that I have highlighted one name in that list of early Myrings: John Myring, recorded as living in the delightfully-named settlement of Sheepy Magna, Leicestershire, in 1628. John is the very earliest Myring that can be connected in a direct and complete genealogical line to the present day (excepting his widowed mother Margaret, who was buried in Sheepy Magna on 17 January 1628). He is my oldest confirmed Myring ancestor.

However, he was not the first Myring connected to Sheepy Magna. The compilers of the Oxford Dictionary did not include one Francis de Meryng of Meering, Nottinghamshire, who is recorded in the Chancery papers[ii] on 22 June 1393 as granting: “a toft [homestead] in Sheepy Magna and the advowson [the right to recommend a member of the clergy for permanent office] of half the church to the prioress and convent of Fosse, who may appropriate the [right to nominate the clergyman], the grantors retaining the manor of Meering, Notts.” This shows that there was a connection between Meering - a probable location of the earliest bearers of the Myring name - and Sheepy Magna some 250 years before we find my earliest confirmed ancestor in Sheepy.

Sadly the gap between the Francis de Meryng of 1393 and John Myring of 1628 cannot be bridged as complete parish records do not stretch back that far, but perhaps further investigation will help to make further connections between the Myrings of Sheepy Magna and the very earliest recorded Myrings three centuries before.

My next article on the Myrings will look in more detail at John Myring and his family in Sheepy Magna, and examine his descendants’ move to Kingsbury, Warwickshire in the 18th century.

BM January 2018

NB: I am heavily indebted here, and in future articles, to Di Eaton née Myring of the Guild of One-Name Studies, who has strived for decades to compile much of the information used to trace the Myrings back to Sheepy Magna.

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[i] Malone, Kemp. "The With-Myrgings of Widsith." The Modern Language Review, Vol. 39, No. 1 (Jan., 1944), pp. 55-56.

[ii] Chancery papers C/143/423/14. This Francis could conceivably be the same as the one mentioned in the Derbyshire patent rolls for 1400.