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Updated June 9, 2019

Family name origins & meanings

  • English (Devon) : habitational name, primarily from Wakeham in Devon, named from the Old English byname Waca (meaning ‘watchful’) + Old English hām ‘homestead’, and to a lesser extent from either of two other places called Wakeham: one in Sussex, which has the same etymology, and the other on the Isle of Portland in Dorset, which is probably named from an Old English wacu ‘watch’, ‘wake’ + cumb ‘valley’.

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