Does "SHAP-land" mean "land of sheep" ?
I posted the following message on the SHAPTON forum. The question is the same here - just subsititute the suffix '-land' for the '-ton' in my other message.
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I was listening today to a genealogist on Canadian public radio, who said that names beginning with "shap-" usually referred to "sheep" (from Dutch "schaap"). Adding the English suffix '-ton' meaning a type of enclosure (in early days a pen for animals, later it became more of a wall of a small town or village), you would get something like "an enclosed place where sheep are kept".
Is this the correct interpretation of this surname ?
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My question therefore is - does SHAP-LAND mean "the land of sheep" ?
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Re: Does "SHAP-land" mean "land of sheep" ?
Lori Hodgson 1/31/02