Stanier in my family tree
1: English (chiefly Staffordshire): occupational name for a stonecutter, one who cut and dressed stone, Middle English stanyer (from stan, stone [Old English stān] + a reduced form of hewer, agent derivative of hew(en), to cut, chop [Old English hēawan], assimilated to the agent suffix -(i)er).
2: Walloon (Meuse valley): an occupational name for a tinsmith, from Latin stagnum, stannum, pewter. A similar derivation, or derivation from occupational names relating to the mining of tin, is sometimes suggested for the English name. This seems unconvincing, as the name does not occur in Cornwall, the main tin-mining County.
Variants: Staniar, Stanyer, Stonehewer, Stonier, Stonyer.
The surname Stanier has been found in various forms, but the main family now bearing it can be traced back to John Stonhewer, living in Staffordshire in 1560. The name has also occurred in the spellings Stonhewing and Stonyer. Francis Stonyer (1737 — 1805), mayor of Newcastle Under Lyme STS, changed the spelling of his name to Stanier.
A William Stanhewaa is mentioned in the Doomsday survey of Oxfordshire (1085-6); Thomas Stonhewa or Stonewaa, appears in the Hundred rolls for Oxfordshire in 1275-9; and Walter Stanhewer is recorded in 13th century Kirkstall YKS. These dates are early in the history of hereditary surnames, which appeared in England shortly after the Norman Conquest, but only as Norman references to the estates in France from which the families came, rather than native English. It is thus likely that these Stonehewer variants refer merely to the occupation of the man rather than his family.
A Thomas Stonehewer is recorded as renting a quarry in Congleton CHS in 1372-3, and a Roger Stonehewer the same quarry in 1423. If these men are related, this could be the period in which the occupational reference became the surname.
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