This interesting surname is of Anglo-Saxon origin, and is a locational name from any of the various places named with the Olde English pre 7th Century "ac", Middle English "oke", oak, with "land", estate, landed property, portion of a village, district; hence, "land abounding in oak trees". These places include the reduced localities of Oaklands in the Shardlow rural district of Derbyshire; north of Nelson in Lancashire; near Daresbuy, Cheshire, and also Oaklands in Sussex, Surrey, Essex and Gloucestershire. Locational surnames were originally given to the lord of the manor, or as a means of identification to those who left their place of origin to settle elsewhere. Occasionally, the surname may be topographical from residence on a patch of land covered in oak trees. Early recordings of the surname include: Richard Ackelonde (Somerset, 1327), and Cristian Ocklande, who married Edwarde Deane in Kingston upon Thames, Surrey, on September 1st 1551. In the modern idiom the name has a number of spelling variations including: Ackland, Acland, Ocklin, Ockland and Oakland. On February 14th 1647, Thomas Oakland and Elizabeth Beard were married at St. Martin in the Fields, Westminster, London. The Coat of Arms most associated with the name is a red shield having a gold bend charged with three green trefoils between a lion rampant in chief and three lozenges in base of the second. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Robert de Acland, which was dated 1275, in the "Cartulary of Oseney Abbey", Oxfordshire, during the reign of King Edward 1, known as "The Hammer of the Scots", 1272 - 1307. 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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