This uncommon name is of Anglo-Saxon origin, and is a locational surname, reflecting local dialectal influences, from the town of Cheltenham in Gloucestershire. The place is recorded very early, in the Saxon Chartulary of 803, as "Celtanham", and appears in the Domesday Book of 1086 as "Chinteneham", while in the 1156 Pipe Rolls of Gloucestershire it is "Chilteham". The name means "the water meadow by the hill(s)", derived from the ancient British (pre-Roman) hill name "Celte", with the Olde English pre 7th Century "homm, hamm", flat, low-lying meadow on a stream, or an enclosed plot, a close.
Locational surnames were acquired by the lord of the manor, and local landowners, and especially by those former inhabitants of a place who moved to another area, and were thereafter best identified by the name of their birthplace. Regional and dialectal differences and varying standards of literacy subsequently gave rise to variant forms of the original name, as in the case of Shillam, also found as Chel(l)am, Chel(t)nam, Chellenham, Shillom and Shellum. Examples of the name from Gloucestershire Church Registers include: the marriage of Thomas Shillam and Agnes Heaven, on November 9th 1577, at Kings Stanley, and the christening of Edward Shillam at Minchinhampton, on October 23rd 1586. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of William Shillam, which was dated February 2nd 1566, marriage to Katerine Poole, at Woodchester, Gloucestershire, during the reign of Queen Elizabeth 1, known as "Good Queen Bess", 1558 - 1603. 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.
The origin, the coat of arms or the different heraldic shields, and the bibliography in which the surname shellum is mentioned are part of this exciting investigation.
The list of countries with a higher presence of people with the surname shellum provides us with a perspective on the history of the surname, beyond its origins, focusing on its migrations.
For those like you, who are interested in the history hidden behind the surname shellum, it is essential to find all kinds of information, both direct and tangential, that helps to construct a solid narrative of how the birth and expansion of shellum developed.
We keep our website updated through our own research and also thanks to contributions from people like you, after verification; so if you have information about shellum and send it to us, we will update it on this website.
Sadly, not all the contributions of those who bore the surname shellum were recorded by the chroniclers of the time. It is our desire to highlight in this section those individuals with the surname shellum who, for various reasons, have left their mark on the course of history.
The origin, history, coat of arms or different coats of arms, and the heraldry of shellum are recorded in a wide variety of sources and documents that are essential to know for better compilation.
These sources are essential for initiating the understanding of shellum, and at the same time, of surnames in general.