This is a metonymic occupational name for a maker of a particular type of cake. The name derives from the medieval English "kake" or "cake" meaning a small oval-shaped flattened bread usually baked hard on both sides by being turned in the process. The surname from this source is first recorded in the early 13th Century, (see below). One, Gilbert Kake appears in the 13th Century "Charters of Northamptonshire". The name, with variant spellings cakes, cak(k) and Kake, is well recorded in London Church Registers from the mid 16th Century. On October 9th 1553 Ysbell Cakes and John Modame were married in St. Andrews, Enfield, and on January 29th 1563 one Thomas Cake married an Alice Blower in St. Mary Magdalene, Bermondsey, London. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Alured Cake, which was dated 1210, in the "Pipe Rolls of Norfolk", during the reign of King John, known as "Lackland", 1199 - 1216. Surnames became necessary when governments introduced personal taxation. In England this was known as Poll Tax. Throughout the centuries, surnames in every country have continued to "develop" often leading to astonishing variants of the original spelling.

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