This is an English surname. It is locational from a place now spelt as Loxton in the county of Somerset, so called from the personal name Lewis of ancient pre 7th century origins, itself meaning "famous warrior", and the Medieval word "tone" probably deriving from the Olde English word "tun", meaning a farm or settlement, or the River Tone, in the same area. It is claimed that the Norman-Frennch invaders of 1066 brought the name Clouis or Louis to England, where in time it also transposed to Lewis or Lowis, offering another possibility for the origin of the placename. An early example of this surname is the recording of Bernard Luxton in the register of students at Oxford University in 1594. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Henry de Lewistone. This was dated 1292, in the Pipe Rolls of the county of Hampshire, during the reign of King Edward Ist of England also known by the ncikname of "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.