This is an interesting and unusual name of English origin and is a dialectal variant of Tiffin. The derivation is from the Medieval female given name Tiffania, the Old French "Tiphaine" and the Greek "Theophanica", and is a compound of "theos", God and "phainein", to appear. This name was often given to girls born around the feast of Epiphany, and as a baptismal name was still popular in Cornwall during the 17th Century. During the 16th and 17th Centuries, there was a significant influx of French and Flemish Huguenot's into Britain to escape the religious persecution in their own countries. One such couple Estienne Tuffin and Catherine Marman christened there daughter Anne Tuffin at the French Huguenot Church in Threadneedle Street, London on May 2nd 1624. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Christina Typhayn, which was dated circa 1272, Somerset, during the reign of King Edward I, 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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