Background Information

For additional Fulton Background Information please refer to Roberta Fulton Hirth's web page. Roberta is apparently not a member of our Fulton family, but she has gathered a great deal of data that we did not have available. Her site is extremely interesting.
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Name Origin

The origin of the name Fulton seems to be as elusive as records of some of the members of the family.

In George F. Black's book "The Surnames of Scotland", printed in 1946, we find the following information:

"Fulton : from a place in Ayrshire which I am unable to find. There was an old village of the name in the parish of Bedrule, Roxburghshire.
The first mention of the name in records seems to be that of Thomas de Fulton, who witnessed a donation to the monastery of Paisley, circa 1260. In 1272 he witnessed a quitclaim of the land of Fulton.
Thomas de Fultoun and Alan de Fultoun witnessed grants by Malcolm, earl of Levenax to Paisley in 1273, and Alan appears again in 1284 as witness to a registration.
Henry de Foultone of Lanarkshire rendered homage in 1296, as did Thomas de Fultone, vicar of the church of Irnewyk (Innerwick) and Thomas de Fougheltone of Lanarkshire.
Robert Fultoun possessed a tenement in Glasgow in 1554."

And Patrick Hanks and Flavia Hodges, in their book "A Dictionary of Surnames", published by Oxford University Press, 1988, list the name as follows:

"Fulton -- Scots and N. Irish
1. contracted form of Fullerton
2. habitation name from a place in the former county of Roxburghs (now part of Borders region), so called from Old English fugol - bird, plus tun - enclosure or settlement."

However, Augustus Wilfrid Dilquist in his book "These Names of Ours", published by Thomas Y. Crowell Company in 1938, states:

"Fulton - A Scottish local name from Fulton in Roxburghshire. The name means 'leafy town' from fulye - a leaf. Fulton may sometimes be altered from Felton ('field town')."

Spelling Variations

At least twenty one variant spellings of the name have been found:

deFultoun	Ffulton	Ffultone	Ffultoun	Filton	Folton
Fougheltone	Foulton	Foultone	Foultoune	Foultown	Fulden
Fullton	Fulltone	Fultin	Fulton	Fultone	Fultoun
Fultoune	Fultown	Pfulton

This lack of a consistent name spelling, as recently as 1800, seriously hampers research into early members of our family. It is quite possible that many of our ancestors' names were pronounced 'Fulton', but just weren't spelled that way.

Groupings of Scottish People

In early Scotland, people were divided into groups as follows:

Family -- those persons related by blood and marriage.
Clan -- a number of families claiming a common ancestor and following the same hereditary chieftain.
Tribe -- groups of unrelated families living within a specific area.
Sept -- members of a collateral branch of the clan, or survivors from clans wiped out in battle or shipwreck who attached themselves to another clan. These persons were known as "broken men" and many of the names of sept members are not obviously Scottish.

The Fultons seem to be a family, and were probably aligned with various tribes and clans at different times in their history.

Crests and Shields

In Burke's "General Armory" page 382, there are listed four different coats-of-arms for the name Fulton. In Scottish and English heraldry, only direct descendants of the chief who used a coat-of-arms are allowed to use that coat-of-arms as a means of family identification. Our family does not seem to be descended from any of the Fultons with known coats-of-arms.

Table of Contents | Index of Names Earlier Fultons | James and Ann Christopher Fulton
The children: William, James, Anna Nancy, Alexander, Robert
Queries and/or Comments

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URL:http://www.yawp.com/fulton
This is a genuine MOM (Mother of Michael) site estone@yawp.com
Michael A. Stone, Owner, janitor, and chief data rancher for YAWP (Yet Another Webservice Provider...)
15 August 2002
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