Chesman

Variation – Chessman
Racial Origin – English
Source – An occupation

This is another family name of the persons who first started its use in the hereditary sense.

You might suspect from its obvious formation that it has some reference to the ancient game of chess, but this is not so.  The doubling of the “s” in one form of the name is but a modern development.

If you remember that the “ee” so often occurring in modern English is a strictly modern development of spelling, and that in nearly every case it was originally an “e,” and that the “ee” was only rarely met with back in the days when family names were being formed, you get your clue to the origin of the name.

The word “cheese.” For instance, was spelled “chese” or “ches” in some cases, for there was no universal standard of spelling in those days such as has developed since the growth of the printing industry and the publication of grammars and dictionaries. This would give ground for the theory that the name originally meant “cheeseman.” Actual historical records of the period when the name was used in the descriptive sense absolutely substantiates this.

The original chesmans were dealers in, or makers of cheese, and knowing what we do of the industrial and commercial system of medieval England, the assumption that they were in the most case both is reasonable.