This interesting surname, recorded in English church registers from the mid 16th Century under the variant spellings Cranage, Cranidge, Crenage, Crinidge etc., is of English locational origin from a place in Cheshire called Cranage. Recorded variously as Croeneche in the Domesday Book of 1086, as Craulach circa 1215 and as Cranach in the "Chartulary of the Abbey of St. Werburgh", Chester, dated 1290, the place was so called from the old English pre 7th Century "crawena", the plural form of "craw", crow plus the old English "laecc", Medieval English "lache", a stream flowing through boggy land; hence, "crow's stream". On May 14th 1592 Katherine, daughter of George Cranage, was christened in Manchester Cathedral, Manchester, Lancashire and on December 11th 1660 Winifred Crinidge married Richard Hauge in Rotherham, Yorkshire. Sarah Crinage, an infant was christened in St. Peter's, Leeds, on April 1st 1684 and on September 16th 1832 the christening of Elizabeth Crinage took place in Sandiacre, Derbyshire. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Mergeret Crannadg, (marriage to John Hampton), which was dated October 28th 1556,in Muckleston, Staffordshire, during the reign of Queen Mary, known as "Bloody Mary", 1553 - 1558. 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.