A
Smith, Williams, Brown are common surnames that you will meet in Britain. However, you may come across some strange English surnames. The following surnames are rare, but they are real.
Gotobed
You are not going to meet many people with the surname “Go-to-bed”. The first recorded person to have this surname was John Gotobedde of Cambridge in 1269. Professor Reaney, an authority on English surnames, explains the surname originated from people who had a bed, which was rare back in the 12th century. People were proud that they could afford to have a bed, thus adding it to their name. Strange but true!
Onions
This surname, which was first popular in France and Ireland before coming over to the UK, dates back to l279 and identified （显示） a person’s job. He was either a seller or a grower of the vegetable.
Nutter
Nutter means a crazy or silly person in spoken English. You wouldn’t usually call yourself a nutter, but it’s genuinely a surname that originates from Yorkshire and Lancashire. It’s a variation of the old English surnames “Notere ”, which means a clerk, and “Nothard”, which means a person that keeps oxen.
Hardmeat
might have guessed that “Hardmeat” must have something to do with a family of butchers. In fact, it might just have been a misspelling of the village that the name came from, which was “Hardmead” in England. Wish they had a spellchecker back then!
（ ）21. Which of the following surnames can tell a family’s wealth?
A. Nutter. B. Onions. C. Gotobed. D. Hardmeat.
（ ）22. What do Onions and Nutter have in common?
A. They originated in the UK. B. They mean silly people.
C. They date from the l3th century. D. They show the jobs.
（ ）23. Where does the surname of Hardmeat come from?
A. An incorrectly-spelt village name.
B. A place famous for hard meat.
C. A village without a spellchecker.
D. A family of butchers.
