The Hundley Surname Project

Welcome to the mystery of the origin of the “Hundley” surname.   This is a mystery that DNA evidence can solve if those with the “Hundley” surname participate in this Family Tree DNA project.  What is the origin of the “Hundley” surname?  Different sources give different answers.  Is it a variation of the locational surname given to those who lived in the Village of “Huntley” in , near the border with ?  Is it a variation in the “Huntly” surname, whose head is the Earl of Huntly and the Chief of the Gordon Clan of Scotland?    Is it a variation of the “Handley” surname from , where they were given lands by the Duke of Normandy for their role in conquering in Battle of Hastings in 1066?  Is it a variation in the Irish Clan “Handley” surname?   Is it a name given by the Anglo-Saxons who invaded in the 5th century to those who lived near a pasture of hounds?  Is it a name given to those who came from Handley in ?   Is "Hunley" a variation of the "Hundley" surname?   Is it the surname of their slave-owner adopted by former African-American slaves?   Could this be a surname with multiple independent origins where many of these answers are true? 

A surname is a name added to a given, or first, name (e.g., “John”) and is part of a personal name (e.g., “John Hundley”).  In many cases, a surname is a family name.  In many Western countries a surname is commonly called a “last name”.    Surnames were uncommon in the 12^th century and still somewhat rare in the 13^th century.  It took several centuries before the majority of Europeans had a surname.  Surnames became necessary when governments introduced personal taxation.

Many European surnames were occupational or locational names and served to distinguish one person from another if they happened to live near each other (e.g., two different people with the name “John” could conceivably be identified as “John Hunter” and “John Butcher”).   The English surname “Hunter” is an occupational name that refers to someone who hunted for a living.  The English surname “Huntley” is a locational name that refers to a person from the of in , near the border with .  The place was first recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086 as “Hunterlie” which means the “hunters wood”. 

Surnamedb.com believes “Hundley” is a variation of the spelling of “Huntley”.   There once was a “Huntley” surname project at Family Tree DNA with 55 members.   According to the former administrator of this project, none of the members had the surname, “Hundley”.  He once compared DNA results with a “Hundley” and they did not match.  A search of the Church of England records for Gloucestershire from 1600 through 1650 found many individuals with the surname “Huntley”, but none with the surname “Hundley”.    (NOTE:  English records prior to 1830 are by shire (i.e., county) and are Church of England parish records.  It is possible that the “Hundleys” were not members of the Church of England (e.g., Quakers) and were thus not in these records.)   If “Hundley” is a variation in the spelling of “Huntley”, there should be at least a few matches among the members of the “Hundley” and “Huntley” projects.  It should be noted that occupational and locational surnames can result in unrelated people having the same surname.  Thus one would not expect everyone with the surname “Hunter” to have the same ancestry or everyone with the surname “Huntley” to have the same ancestry.

Complicating the “Hundley” versus “Huntley” question is the “Huntly” surname.  The chief of the Gordon Clan of Scotland is the Earl of Huntly.  The town of is in , where the ruins of are located.  Both the “Huntly” and “Huntley” surnames are part of the Gordon Clan Surname Project in Family Tree DNA with 400 members.  If “Hundley” is a variation of “Huntly” there should be a few matches with those in the Gordon Clan surname project. 

There is another competing theory about the origin of the “Hundley” surname.  According to HouseOfNames.com:

“’Hundley’ is a name that was brought to by the ancestors of the Hundley family when they migrated to the region after the Norman Conquest of 1066.  The Hundley family lived in Handley, Hampshire.   The name was local in nature, and was derived from the Old English words ‘heah’ which meant high and ‘leah’ which meant wood.  Another derivation indicates the name is a corruption of the Norman-place name ‘Andeli’ which was brought over after the conquest of 1066.  Time has confused to two derivations, and etymologists now disagree on which is appropriate in a given case.”   

“Spelling variations in names were a common occurrence before English spelling was standardized a few hundred years ago in the Middle Ages, even the literate changed the spellings of their names as the English language incorporated elements of French, Latin, and other European languages.  Many variations of the name “Hundley” have been found, including Handley, Hanley, Handeley, Hanly, and others.”

“First found in Hampshire where they held a family seat from very early times and were granted lands by Duke William of , their liege Lord, for their distinguished assistance in the Battle of Hastings in 1066 A.D.”

There is a Hampshire, England Project through Family Tree DNA with 122 members. If the “Hundley” surname came from , there may be a few matches with the Hampshire England Project members and others whose origins trace back to the region of .  Unfortunately, the “Hundley” surname is not listed as one included in the Hampshire, project.   The HouseOfNames.com theory raises the question whether the “Hundley” surname is a variation of the “Handley” surname.    Complicating this question is a web site for the Irish Clan “Handley” which list “Hundley” as a variation in the spelling of this Irish clan name.  

There is yet another competing theory about the origin of the “Hundley” surname.  According to Meaning-Of-Names.com the meaning of Hundley is:  “one who came from Handley (high grove) in Northhamptonshire; or a dweller at the Houndlea or Hunda’s Lea (hound pasture) in ”.   English began as a Germanic language.  In German and Old English, “hund” means dog or hound.  The German surname “Hund” is an occupational name for the keeper of dogs for hunting and other purposes.  In German the “d” is pronounced more like a “t”.  The Anglo-Saxons were Germanic tribes that invaded beginning in the early 5^th century.  The Anglo-Saxon era ended in with the Norman invasion in 1066.   The administrator's great uncle believed that the surname was originally “Hundley”, but over time evolved into “Huntley” for those who remained in the British Isles, but those who migrated to in the 1600’s kept the original spelling.  There is a British Isles Project at Family Tree DNA with 4680 members that is focused on understanding the haplogroup (i.e., a group that shares a common ancestor) distribution in the early history and settlement of the British Isles.  It is possible that the Anglo-Saxons, , and Romans who invaded during different eras have distinguishable DNA.

One variation of the “Hundley” surname is “Hunley” (e.g., as in the famous Confederate Civil War submarine).  Several early American genealogies show members of the same family with these two different spellings.  Early land records show various spelling of the name including “Hundley”, “Hundly”, “Hunley”, and “Hunly”. The spelling obviously depended on who wrote the records.  The pronunciation of “Hundley” in some areas of the southern sounds like “Hunley”, with the “d” being silent.  Matches among persons with the “Hundley” and “Hunley” surnames should confirm that these are variations in the spelling of the same family name.

The surname “Hundley” ranks #3891 in terms of the most common surnames in the for 2000.  “Hundley” had 8,382 occurrences in the 2000 census.  Today, the surname “Hundley” is rare in the with only 96 occurrences (54 of them are in Worcestershire).  A comparison of the number of occurrences in the most recent census of the Hundley, Huntley, Huntly, Hunley, and Handley surnames in the and the is as follows:

For the last name of “Hundley”, the United States Census Bureau reports the following race/ ethnic origin breakdown:

Because some of the people with the “Hundley” surname were slave-owners in the American South prior to the Civil War and many slaves adopted the surnames of their slave-owners, it is likely that most of the White and Black “Hundley’s” have different DNA patterns.   There are Family Tree DNA projects that can help sort this out.   For example, the “Handley” surname is one of several hundred included in the Black Belt of Alabama Project with 441 members and is intended for use by African Americans researching their roots in central Alabama. 

The administrator is most likely a descendant of Phillip Hundley who was born in before 1631.  If the administrator is indeed a descendant of Philip Hundley, his DNA should match other descendants of Phillip Hundley.  At least one other person listed with Y-Search.Org traces their ancestry back to Phillip Hundley.   The administrator's DNA does not match this individual - there is a genetic distance of 43 between them on just 37 markers, meaning they are not related.  The pedigree (family tree) for this person shows that the surname “Hundley” was changed to “Huntley” after eight generations – such name changes are another complication in comparing those with the “Hundley” and “Huntley” surnames.  

It is possible that many of the different theories of the origin of the “Hundley” surname can be proven true by different individual DNA evidence.  Surnames were becoming more widely adopted in the during the 14^th and 15^th centuries.  At this same time, pronunciation of the English language was undergoing change.  English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of .  A significant number of English words were constructed based on roots in Latin.  The Norman conquest of in 1066 gave rise to heavy borrowings from Norman French.  What is known as the “great vowel shift” took place in between 1350 and 1500 and led to the development of Modern English.   Different language traditions had different pronunciations.  For example, in French the pronunciation of the ‘an’ vowel-consonant combination has a nasal sound and is similar to the English sound in “on”.  The French pronunciation of the ‘un’ vowel-consonant combination has a nasal sound and is similar to the English sound in “under”.  In French the ‘h’ is silent (e.g., hotel is “oh-tehl”).  In German words ending in the consonant ‘d’ have a ‘t’ sound in English (e.g., the German word “hund” sounds like “hundt” in English).   Many people at the time surnames were being adopted could not write.  The different language traditions of those who could write influenced what they heard and subsequently wrote.    In this changing English language environment, the surname “Hundley” could easily have been what was heard and documented by different people in different places in the .

Complicating the quest for the origins of the “Hundley” surname is the administrator's haplotype which is J2a4h2a (shorthand J – L70+) and which has its closest match in .  The J haplogroup originated in the Middle East 25,000 years ago and the J2 subdivision spread around the Mediterranean with the diffusion of agriculture from the fertile crescent in .     The administrator,s ancestors most likely came to the British Isles with the Roman settlers and troops who occupied from 43 until 410 AD.  This would have been roughly 70 generations ago.  Because the administrator's haplogroup is a relatively small percentage of the population in the , it may be easier to establish relatedness with any other “Hundleys” with this haplotype.      

Questions the Hundley surname Project seeks to answer include:

1. Do any individuals with the “Hundley” surname have DNA matching any members of the former Huntley surname project?
2. Do any individuals with the “Hundley” surname have DNA matching any members of the Hampshire England Project?
3. Do any individuals with the “Hundley” surname have DNA matching any members of the Gordon Clan surname project?
4. Do any individuals with the “Hundley” surname have DNA matching a person with the “Handley” surname?  If so, is this “Handley” a descendant of the Irish clan “Handley” or a descendant of an ancestor from either Hampshire or Northhamptonshire in ?
5. Do any individuals with the “Hundley” surname have DNA which can be traced back to the Anglo-Saxon tribes that invaded in the 5^th century?
6. Does the DNA of different individuals with the “Hundley” surname support different theories of the origin of the surname? (i.e., Does DNA evidence support multiple theories of the origin of the “Hundley” surname rather than a single theory?).   
7. To what extent do persons with the “Hundley” and “Hunley” surnames have matching DNA?
8. To what extent do White and Black persons with the “Hundley” surname have different DNA?
9. To what extent is Phillip Hundley the common early ancestor of Americans with the “Hundley” surname?  Does the DNA of the descendants of Phillip Hundley support a particular theory about the origin of the surname?