Rundle Surname

*Note: I took this information from The Rundle Family: From Cornwall to America. The link is at the bottom of the page. I just wanted to make sure that is was saved somewhere.~Mary Stanford Pitkin.

The name is known to be of great antiquity in Cornwall. Several branches are still resident in the neighborhoods of Looe and Liskeard. In addition, branches have spread to the US, Canada, Austrailia, South Africa and all over England

All of the different spellings were typically linked to a common root, one of the nobles at the Battle of Hastings. It has been differently spelled as Rundle, Randall and Rendle, amongst others. Scribes recorded and spelled the name as it sounded. It was not unlikely that a person would be born with one spelling, married with another, and buried with a headstone, which showed another. All three spellings related to the same person. Sometimes preferences for different spelling variations either came from a division of the family, or, had religious reasons, or sometimes-patriotic reasons. In my accounts, I have spelled the name as found.

According to A Dictionary of British Surnames written by P.H. Reaney, the surname RUNDLE might be a diminutive of rond v. ROUND and was used to describe the man who was slightly round at the middle. Occasionally, RUNDLE identified the man who was from RUNDALE, in Shoreham Parish, Kent.

The RUNDLE name is found in the Domesday Book of 1086. It was a notable English family name. But the documented connections to the family name start in the 13^th century in a small manor near Cobham, Kent. This site is now called Randall Wood and is a nature reserve. The great Baronial family of Cobham was seated as Lords of the manor Roundell in the parish of Shorne. John Cobham gave the Manor of Rundale to his second son. He was styled Lord Thomas de Cobham, alias Roundell, Knight. From this scion many branches descended, many with different spellings of the name Roundell, into the counties of Devonshire, Cornwall and Somerset. Stephen de Cobham de Rundele in 1326 became the first Baron Rundell.

The Cobhams de Rundale died out in Kent, but it seems likely this family was the source of the many Rundles in Devon (where at one time they were the holders of thirteen farms) and Cornwall in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.

In 1301 a John de Cobham de Rundale of Devon had inherited, by marriage, the ownership of the Manor of Hilton near Launceston and property at Trematon in Cornwall and two manors in south-west Devon. With the death of his son John, the second Baron Rundell in 1362, we are told that the short lived title became extinct, even though he had two sons, Thomas and John.

The family succession leading to the Rundles of Hole (a farm at St. Neot) may well have been this:

1203	Henry de Cobham granted Manor of Cobham.
1245	John de Cobham acquires neighboring Manor of Rundale with fifty acres.
13^th century	His son, Henry de Cobham inherits Rundale.
1326	His son, Stephen de Cobham de Rundele becomes first Baron Rundell.
14^th century	His son, John becomes second Baron Rundell.
1429	His son, Thomas is owner of Rundale.
1301-1316	John de Cobham acquires, through marriage, properties in south-west Devon.
Early 14^th C	Members of the family settle in southwest Devon.
1539-1700	Many Rundles recorded in the Parish Registers of Lamerton, Milton Abbot and Sydenham Damerell (had interests in thirteen farms in 1588). A stone in the church of Lamerton records the burial of “William Roundell of Willastreive” in 1532.
C 1500	A section of the family splits off to Antony and nearby Maker (Richard Rundle mentioned in Muster Rolls 1559 and his will 1587, William’s will 1592, several Rundles in Maker Register of the time).
1598	Rundles split off to Hole (a farm at St. Neot). James Rundle was churchwarden and a “twelve-man” of St. Neot in 1611.