This interesting surname with variant spellings Flood, Floud, Fludd, Flude, Flew, Floyd, Floyde, Floyed, etc. is either an English topographical name for someone who lived by a small stream or an intermittent spring, deriving from the Old English pre 7th Century "flod(e)", from "flowan" meaning "to flow", or, it is a dialectal variant of the welsh name Lloyd, a nickname for a person with grey hair or who habitually dressed in grey, from the Welsh "Llwyd" "grey". The surname dates back to the late 12th Century, (see below). Further recordings include one Roger Flod (circa 1200) "Documents illustrative of the Social and Economic History of the Danelaw", and John de la Flode (1273) "The Hundred Rolls of Hampshire". Church recordings include one Frauncis Floode who was christened on November 8th 1542, at St. Michael's, Bassishaw, London, and Rodger Flood married Anne Pratte on April 28th 1576 at St. Margaret's, Westminster. Joseph Flood, (aged 22), a famine emigrant, sailed from Liverpool aboard the Roscius bound for New York on March 7th 1846. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Wigot de la Flode, which was dated 1198, The Pipe Rolls of Berkshire, during the reign of King Richard 1, "The Lionheart", 1189 - 1199. 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.