This is a medieval English surname of nickname origins. Recorded in several spellings including Crump, Crumpe, and sometimes as the overlap surnames Cramp and Crimp, it was originally a physical description of a person with a crooked back or limbs, or given the robust humour of the 12th century, the reverse! Deriving from the ancient word of the pre 7th century, crump, meaning curved, it is typical of a wide range of similar surnames such as Crook, Curtin, Pate, or Stubbs, that refer to some physical characteristic of the namebearer. These examples are fairly polite, those that were really offensive or obscene, having now passed into history, as society has beome more "genteel". This surname is one of the very earliest first ever recorded anywhere in the world, and examples of these recordings include Adam le Crumpe in the Assize Rolls for Staffordshire in the year 1203, whilst from the later post medieval church registers we have John Crump, who was christened at the church of St. Mary Whitechapel, Stepney, London, in 1599. The first recorded spelling of the family name is believed be that of Peter Crumpe, in the Pipe Rolls for the county of Berkshire, in the year 1156. This was in the reign of King Henry 11, known as "The church builder", 1154 - 1189. Throughout the centuries, surnames in every country have continued to "develop" often leading to astonishing variants of the original spelling.

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