This interesting name is of French origin, introduced into England by the Normans after 1066 in the form Miles, thought to derive from the Germanic personal name Mild, itself possibly akin to the Slavic element "mil", mercy. In English documents of the Middle Ages, the name normally appears in the Latin form Milo, but the usual medieval form would have been Mile, so we assume that the final "s" must represent the possessive ending of "son of" or "servant of Mile". As a surname Miles is ambiguous, as the latin word for a soldier is "Miles". On June 25th 1553, Thomas Myles married Elisabeth Myllar in St. Stephen's, Coleman Street, London. William Mylas was christened on July 9th 1568 in St. Andrew's, Undershaft, London. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Nicholas Miles, which was dated 1177, Pipe Rolls of Sussex, during the reign of King Henry II, The Builder of Churches, 1154 - 1189. 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.