ESPINOZA Family History

This ancient surname is recorded in some forty spelling forms. These range from Epine, Lepine, Delepine, (French) to Espinas and Espinoza (Spanish) and Spinelli (Italian). The surname is usually recorded in most dictionaries of surnames as being of early French origins, but is not so. It is more correctly Roman (Latin), and derives its origin from the pre Christian word 'spina', a description for a person who lived either by a prominent thorn bush, or more probably a defensive area protected by thorn bushes, or on the ridge or spine of a hill.