I hate to be the one to burst your bubble, but all people with the Rowland surname are not related to each other. Additionally, there is no common point of our surname origin. This may seem like a bold statement, but I’m going to back it up with solid DNA evidence and a little common sense. As usual, I’m not talking about just the Rowland spelling. This also applies to Roland, Rowlands, Ruland, Rohland, Rolland, and about a dozen other variants.
The First Rowland was Probably Roland
The first Rowland was probably Roland, although there is no way to know for sure. Most historians (and genealogists) agree the name Roland first appeared more than 1,200 years ago. Roland, the Paladin Warrior and nephew of Charlemagne, was born in 736 and died on 15 Aug 778 at the Battle of Roncevaux Pass. The battle is recounted in the 11th century The Song of Roland, the oldest surviving major work of French literature.
The Normans used Roland as a personal name. Roland is composed of the Germanic elements hrod/hruod ‘renown’ + land ‘land’, ‘territory’ (or + -nand ‘bold’, assimilated to -lant ‘land’). Translation: “fame of the land.”
However, surnames were not in use at that time. Roland was a given name, and we do not know why his parents named him Roland. As the story of Roland and his heroic actions spread, so did the use and popularity of Roland as a given name.
Rollo the Dane
About 130 years after the death of Roland, along came Rollo the Dane. Considered a Viking, he was the Count of Rouen, and became the first ruler of Normandy. One has to wonder, did Rollo’s parents name him after the legendary hero Roland? Rollo’s son was William Longsword, his son was Richard I, and four generations later came the birth of William, who you may know as William the Conqueror, the Duke of Normandy who became the King of England in 1066.
It was these Normans that brought the Roland name to England, where the “w” began to appear. However, it was used only as given name, as the usage of surnames was still more than a hundred years away.
The use of surnames began to take hold in the late 12th century across all of Western Europe. It was a slow process, although by the year 1400, 75% of England’s population had a surname, and the process was complete by 1450. Wales was a primary exception and was using patronymics, which were last names derived from the father’s given name. Keep these dates in mind as we look at the DNA evidence.
What the DNA Tells Us
The Rowland DNA Project has identified numerous genealogically distinct Rowland DNA Groups (more than 15 as of this writing). Although they all have a common ancestor that lived more than 47,000 years ago, the Rowland Haplotree shows that each line has been distinct since 1500 BCE (or earlier).
Members of the Rowland Project opting into Big Y-700 testing have discovered they are more closely related to people with different surnames than they are to the other Rowland DNA Groups. The recent introduction of the Big Y Time Time Tree helps us visualize this phenomenon. While two Rowland lines may have had a common ancestor in the Bronze Age, their descendants went separate ways. For the next 3,000 or 4,000 years (which is more than 10,000 generations), these lines propagated and advanced through the Iron Age and Medieval times, all without surnames. Eventually, surnames became the “law of the land,” primarily for taxation purposes, and families had to choose or adopt a surname.
Each genetic line did this independently of the other. Today, we know that one group of related families adopted the surnames of Griffith, Williams, Rowland (DNA Group B), and others. Another line adopted the surnames of Sedgwick, Rowland (DNA Group M), and others. Although members of these two genetic lines have the surname of Rowland, their common ancestor lived about 19,600 BCE (haplogroup R-M173).
Coincidence?
Doubters may claim there is no way that this many families could select the same surname independently. However, let’s look at the process. Before surnames, means of identification often included your ancestry, location, or occupation.
Ancestry example: We already established that Roland/Rowland was a popular given name. The children of Rowland would often be known as John, son of Rowland, along with his brother Thomas, son of Rowland. When surnames came about, they could have easily become John and Thomas Rowlandson, eventually shortened to Rowlands and then dropping the ‘s’ at the end. This method of surname adoption easily explains the popularity of Johnson, Williams, Thomson, and other surnames that have commonality with given names.
Location example: There is a parish in Derbyshire named Rowland. One of the earliest known documents (circa 1230) from there refers to a man called William de Roland. Over the subsequent couple of hundred years, his descendants all went by de Roland (of Roland), but by 1442 the “de” was dropped, and by 1472 “Rowland” became the common spelling. Today, this lineage is known as Rowland DNA Group G — Sheffield/Derbyshire. There’s a place called Roland in Norway, which might possibly be another surname origin. The name is derived from the Old Norse “ra”, roebuck, and “lundr”, wood, grove; thus, “wood of the roebuck”. Yet another example is that of a castle built more than 1100 years ago on the border of what is now Hampshire and Sussex counties of England. Known as Rowland’s Castle. It’s not hard to imagine some families in those counties selecting Rowland as a surname, and perhaps that is the origin of what we now know as Rowland DNA Group O.
Occupation example: We are not aware of Rowland being used as an occupational derivative, although as a child I often wondered that maybe it meant a farmer (one who rows/plows the land) or a ferryman (one who rows the boat to land). While it is unlikely Rowland started as an occupational-based surname, it is easy to accept that Baker, Taylor, Tanner, Smith, and others are.
The View From 1893
The following is taken verbatim from “A Genealogical Sketch of The Posterity of John Rowland of Rhosybayvil“, written in 1893.
The name of Roland, or in its anglicized form Rowland, first appears in the eighth century, and means ” Fame of the Land.” The first to bear the name was Roland, a nephew, and one of the twelve peers, of Charlemagne. The knightly deeds and exploits of Roland, many of which are fabulous and ridiculous, form the subject and theme of fiction during the whole age of chivalry. Ariosto based his poem of Orlando Furioso upon the life and adventures of this valiant knight. Roland and Oliver are two names frequently associated in the literature of early romance and quixotic adventure.
Among the names brought into England by the Normans at the time of the Conquest, A.D. 1066, was that of Roland or Rowland. It has come down to us both as a favorite Christian name and, also, as a surname. The various forms in which it appears in English literature are as follows: Orlando, Roland, Rowland, Rowlands, Rowlandson, Rowlet being a feminine form of Rowland, as Charlotte is of the name Charles. It is always correctly pronounced Roland, and should never have the short o, as in not, odd, etc. The mispronunciation Rowland, often heard in New England, is a provincialism, which even semi-occasional good usage in that locality has failed to render acceptable, except to the illiterate.
This name appears frequently in English literature. Shakespeare, quoting from the fragment of an old Scottish ballad, says, “Childe Rowland to the dark tower came.” Again he uses this name in “As You Like It,” wherein he designates one of his characters as Sir Rowland de Bois. The name also occurs in Sir Walter Scott’s Novels and in other English authors.
It is found throughout Great Britain in its various forms. The Normans made their way into Wales at the time of the Conquest, which may partially account for the existence of this and many other Norman surnames in that country.
In Conclusion
Today, more than 15 distinct genetic Rowland DNA lines have been identified, and this quantity is expected to grow. These families established themselves in different parts of the world more than 3,000 years before the common usage of surnames. Each group independently chose/adopted the surname of Rowland or one of its variants. To think otherwise, would imply the surname was invented/adopted by one family about the year 1300, and then their descendants immediately scattered and established themselves across all of Western Europe. A ludicrous notion at best.