It may not have been the fault if local priest..... just think how local accents may well have distorted the name in the mouths of the happy couple! I certainly have Messam ancestors, who with a thick west country accent, are recorded as Meursum, Merzum and even Mason! Steve On Fri, 1 Jan 2016 14:12:34 -0000, "Gordon" <gordonwb@argonet.co.uk> wrote: >The fun really starts when this occurs with your ancestors surnames and the >spelling changes with the change in parish priest who was usually the only >person who could write at that time. It gets "better" if the priest was hard >of hearing too. I have a case where you would not believe the range of >surname variations, some suggest a deaf priest.