Ismay

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I've seen Ismay (iz-may) getting a lot of love online lately, so I thought I'd give you the history. There's no coincidence that Ismay sounds so close to Esme, meaning "esteemed," although a lot of people like to debate where it came from and how it was used. Some say it's a variant of Ismene, meaning "knowledgeable," or Ismenia, but it is just a variant spelling of Esme, French, which is an older name. This is evidenced by variant spellings like Esmay. It can be found as a surname, as is the case with famous British businessman Bruce Ismay, associated with the Titanic, but also as a first name, as in Ismay Thorne, a British children's author, and Ismay Johnston, an New Zealand actress. It was a matronymic surname (the mother's given name passed to the son as his surname) since at least the 16th century, possibly the 13th century, and in use in medieval times in England. Like Winston, surnames became necessary when the government introduced personal taxation, or the Poll Tax. It can also be found in a couple of books from around the 1980's, such as "What's Bred in the Bone" by Robertson Davies, whose character lived in the 1930's.

White Pages tells us there are 172 people in the U.S. with the first name Ismay, and the most popular decade for the name was 1924. There are also 110 people with Ismay as a last name. In 2011 Ismay was not used, although several similar sounding names were - Ismene, Isatou, Isaura, Islay and of course, Isabella and Esme.

So here's what we know for sure:
Ismay was in use between 1450 and 1650 in England
It has survived until now in both given name and surname form, but is rarely used
Ismay likely derived from Esme
It has been used in literature