Recorded as Linstead, Lynstead, and apparently Linthead, this is an English surnames. It is locational from any or all of the places such as Magna Linstead and Parva Linstead in the county of Suffolk, and Linsted in Kent. The Suffolk villages mean the place where flax was grown, whilst the Kent village is or was, famous for its lime trees. All appear in the famous Domesday Book of 1086, where the spelling seems to have been Linestede. Locational surnames are usually "from" names. That is to say surnames given to people after they left their original village to move somewhere else, as easy identification. In this case "somewhere else" seems to have been quite often the city of London, as the surname is recorded there in some numbers from early Stuart times. The earliest recordings however are from the 13th century and may apply to the then lord of the manor. These recordings include Rischard de Lindested of Kent in the Hundred Rolls of landowners in 1273, and John de Linstead, given as being the vicar of Cawston in Norfolk, in 1370.

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