This interesting surname of English origin is a dialectal variant of the nickname Finch deriving from the Middle English "Finch", old English pre 7th Century "finc" meaning "finch". It may also be a metonymic occupational name for someone who caught finches and sold them as songsters. The surname dates back to the mid 11th Century, (see below). Further recordings include one Gilbert le Finch (1205) "The Curia Regis Rolls of Norfolk", and Thomas Finch (1273), "The Hundred Rolls of Cambridgeshire". Variations in the idiom of the spelling include Fantch, Fanch, Fantche, etc.. One John Fanch married Joane Wootten at Hillingdon, London, on July 1st 1621. Ann, daughter of Thomas and Katheryn Fanch, was christened at St. Bartholomew the Great, London, on February 15th 1628, and James Faunch married Anne Evans at St. Nicholas Cole Abbey, London on November 4th 1701, Thomas Faunch married Rebecca Nicholls at St. Leonard, Shoreditch, London on May 13th 1787. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Godric Finc, which was dated 1049, Old English Bynames, during the reign of King Edward, "The Confessor", 1042 - 1066. 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.