From: Connie <connie.sparrer@gmail.com> > On 19/08/2013 13:11, roy.stockdill@btinternet.com wrote: > > > Reaney & Wilson don't specifically mention either of those names but Hanks > & > > Hodges (Oxford Dictionary of Surnames) say REVIS is a variant of Reeves, and > I > > must admit that was my own initial feeling. > > > > H & H define it as either being patronymic from REEVE (a bailiff or steward) > or > > topographic from someone who lived on the edge of a wood from the Middle > > English "atter eaves". > > > > No mention of Border Reivers, I'm afraid. > > Thank you for the derivation and nicely correcting my misspelling. I'm > surprised it's given as a patronymic, not occupational, name. The topographic > is interesting.> Well, in a sense, Connie, it is both an occupational AND a patronymic name. REEVE was quite obviously an occupational name, referring to an official who was a bailiff or steward (and probably quite important in medieval times), while REEVES simply required the addition of an "s" to indicate that someone of that name might have been a son, daughter, employee, etc, of a Reeve. There is a "Reeve's Tale" in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, is there not? The topographic version arising from a dweller on the edge of a wood appears to be from a quite different origin. That's the problem with trying to explain surnames! Who can tell where they came from? That is why I am a devotee of George Redmonds, who argues that the origin of each and EVERY surname is different and one Smith has a different origin from another Smith. Likewise with Reeves and its variants. -- Roy Stockdill Genealogical researcher, writer & lecturer Famous family trees blog: http://blog.findmypast.co.uk/tag/roy-stockdill/ "There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about." OSCAR WILDE