This interesting name is of Anglo-Saxon origin, and is a locational surname deriving from the place called "Osbaldeston" between Preston and Blackburn in Lancashire. The placename is recorded as "Osbaldeston" in the Lancashire Assize Rolls of 1246 and unusually has retained the early spelling. The name means "Osbald's settlement", derived from the Old English pre 7th Century personal name "Osbald", composed of the elements "Os", meaning good, and "bald", a Germanic word meaning "bold, daring", with "tun", enclosure or settlement. Locational surnames were usually given to the Lord of the Manor and to those former inhabitants who moved to another area. The modern surname can be found as "Osbaldeston", "Osbaldiston", "Osbaldstone", "Osboldstone" and "Osbiston". One Alice Osbaldeston married Leonard Walmsley on the 10th of November 1655 at Preston, Lancashire. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Adam le Osbaldeston, which was dated 1292, The Chartulary of Whalley Abbey, Lancashire, 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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