TRAFFORD
The Trafford surname is an English locational name that originates from several places within the British Isles.
It is derived from Old English elements. The word tref means a farmstead or village, and ford denotes a shallow point across a river where one can cross. Thus the surname originally identified someone who lived near a village by a ford.
Recorded variations include Trafford, Trafforde and Trayford. The name is specifically linked to locations named Trafford in Cheshire, Lancashire and Northamptonshire.
The settlement in Cheshire appears in the Domesday Book of 1086 as Traford and in 1190 as Trocford. Its meaning is the ford in a valley, derived from the Olde English pre‑7th century word trog, meaning trough or valley, combined with ford. The Northamptonshire site, documented as Trayeford in the Domesday Book, is named from traeppe, meaning a fish trap, together with ford. Lancashire’s Trafford was initially called Stratford and appears in the 1206 Pipe Rolls. Here the name means “the road through the ford”, from Olde English straet (road) and ford.
In the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, members of the Trafford family were noted in ecclesiastical records. William Trafforde of Cheshire is listed in the Register of the University of Oxford for 1589, while Henry Trayford served as rector of Wilmslow, Cheshire in 1591.
The earliest documented spelling of the family name is that of Stephen de Trafforde, dated 1292 in the Records of Pleas during the reign of King Edward I (1272‑1307), who was known as “The Hammer of the Scots.”
An early grant of a coat of arms to a Trafford family depicts a red griffin segreant set upon a silver shield.
Today the name is associated with the villages of Bridge Trafford, Mickle Trafford and Wimbolds Trafford in Cheshire, which are the modern remnants of the original settlement first recorded in the Domesday Book.
Typical given names associated with the Trafford surname
Male
- Andrew
- David
- James
- John
- Mark
- Michael
- Paul
- Richard
- Robert
- Stephen
Female
- Amanda
- Barbara
- Catherine
- Elizabeth
- Helen
- Karen
- Lorraine
- Margaret
- Mary
- Nicola
- Sarah
- Susan
- Victoria
- Wendy
Similar and related surnames
Related and similar names are generated algorithmically based on the spelling, and may not necessarily share an etymology.
How to communicate the surname Trafford in...
Braille
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Morse
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Semaphore
There are approximately 2,110 people named Trafford in the UK. That makes it roughly the 4,017th most common surname in Britain. Around 32 in a million people in Britain are named Trafford.
Surname type: Location or geographical feature
Origin: English
Region of origin: British Isles
Country of origin: England
Religion of origin: Christian
Language of origin: English
Famous people named Trafford
- Stan Trafford - Football player
- Tommy Trafford - Comedian (1927 to 1993)
Names and descriptions courtesy of Wikipedia, and may contain errors. This is not intended to be an exhaustive list of every famous person with this name.