This surname is derived from the name of an ancestor. 'the son of William,' from nick. Will. This surname rivals, in the multitude of its representatives, the famous patronymics Johnson, Jackson, Robinson, and Dickson or Dixon; v. Willis.

Adam Wyllson, 1379: Poll Tax of Yorkshire.

Thomas Wyllson, 1379: ibid.

1604. Edward Willson, or Wilson, Lancashire: Register of the University of Oxford.

'Son of Will,' which see. John Wulson was a merchant in the service of Sir John of Mountgomery in 1405 (Bain, IV, 697), Michael Wilsoun was burgess of Irvine in 1418 (Irvine, I, p. 127), and John Wilson was burgess of Berwick in 1467 (RD., 461). Thomas Wolsoun was tenant of Neubotel Abbey in 1563 (Neubotle, p. 328), and Dand Vilsone and Pait Vilsoun were tenants of the abbot of Kelso in 1567 (Kelso, p. 519,524). William Willsoun is recorded as indweller in Cunyngham Baidland in 1662 (Hunter, p. 50). The northern Wilsons are ranked as a sept of Clan Gunn, through George Gunn's son William, who flourished in the fifteenth century. The name was very common in Glasgow in the sixteenth century. Peter Wilson (1746-1825), classical scholar and linguist, professor of Greek and Latin in Columbia University, New York, was born in Ordiquhill, Aberdeenshire; and Alexander Wilson (1766-1813), the American ornithologist, was born in Paisley. For the spelling Wulson compare the Rev. Thomas Chalmers's pronunciation of 'filthy' as 'fulthy.' Villsone 1572, Vylsone 1511, Willesoun 1526, Willson 1668, Wilsoine 1586, Wilsowne 1549, Wilsoune 1554, Wulsone 1568 (this is a common broad pronunciation at the present day), Wylson 1506, Wylsoune 1547; Willsone, Wolson, Wyleson.

See William. The Wilsons of Broomhead resided there, under this name, from temp. Edward I. till the XVIII. century. B.L.G.

The son of William. The family are said to be descended from a Prince of Denmark, and were established at a very remote period in the Orkney islands, intermarrying with the clans of Monro, and others. After a long continuance in the north, alliances taking place with some of the principal Lowland families, the Wilsons moved southward. Motto: "Wilsone will."

The son of William or Will.

Wilson. —Distributed over the whole of England, except in the region south of a line joining the mouths of the Thames and the Severn, where it is absent or rare. It is most crowded in the northern half of the country, being there numerous in all the counties, especially in the North and East Ridings of Yorkshire, the Wilsons, of Broomhead, in the West Biding, resided there from the 13th to the 18th century (Lower), and in Cumberland and Westmoreland; but it has two centres in the southern half of the country, in Worcestershire and Cambridgeshire. It extends in force across the Scottish border, and is very numerous in the region south of the Forth and the Clyde.