Origin of the Name McPhink
The ancient history of the name
McPhink was found in the allfamilycrests.com archives.
Over the centuries Surnames developed a wide number of variants. Different spellings of the same name can be traced back to an original root. Additionally when a bearer of a name emigrated it was not uncommon that their original name would be incorrectly transcribed in the record books at their new location. Surnames were also often altered over the years based on how they sounded phonetically and depending on the prevailing political conditions it may have been advantageous to change a name from one language to another.
Variants of the name McPhink
include Phink, Pink and Pinke. This is a name of nickname origin meaning 'the pink', from a person who was named after a bird such as a beautiful chaffinch. This name is of English descent and is found in many ancient manuscripts in the that country. Examples of such are an Adam Pink, County Norfolk, who was recorded in the 'Hundred Rolls', England , in the year 1273 and a John Pynke, County Somerset, who was recorded in 'Kirby's Quest', in the reign of Edward III. Names were recorded in these ancient documents to make it easier for their overlords to collect taxes and to keep records of the population at any given time.
In Ireland this name and its variants were introduced into Ulster Province by settlers who arrived from England and Scotland , especially during the seventeenth century. It was the 'Plantations of Ireland ' in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries that marked the end of Gaelic supremacy in Ireland . While the influx of settlers in the wake of the earlier Anglo-Norman invasion of the twelfth century resulted in a full integration into Irish society of the new arrivals, the same never occurred with the Ulster Planters who maintained their own distinct identity.
It is most likely in Ulster that the addition of the prefix 'Mc', meaning 'son of', occurred.
The McPhink coat of arms came into existence centuries ago. The process of creating coats of arms (also often called family crests) began in the eleventh century although a form of Proto-Heraldry may have existed in some countries prior to this. The new art of Heraldry made it possible for families and even individual family members to have their very own coat of arms, including all McPhink descendants.