The surname of RUDMAN was derived from the Old English RYDMANN - dweller in the clearing. Also a nickname 'the roodman', the man who lived by the rood or cross. Families acquired a place name as a surname under three different sets of circumstances. Either the man lived or worked in, on or near some topographic formation or landscape feature, either natural or artificial or he formerly lived in a village, town or city and acquired the reputation of being from that place. Finally he owned or was lord of the village or manor designated. In the overwhelming majority of cases it is impossible to say whether a remote ancestor owned the manor or had merely once lived in that place. However, it is safe to say that in most cases a manor or village name merely identifies the place where the original bearer of the name formerly resided. Early records of the name mention Griffin del Rudman of the County of Lancashire in 1246. William atte Rydman in 1339, ibid. William Rudman of Yorkshire, was listed in the Yorkshire Poll Tax of 1379. It has long been a matter of doubt when the bearing of coats of arms first became hereditary and it was not until the Crusades that Heraldry came into general use. Men went into battle heavily armed and were difficult to recognise. It became the custom for them to adorn their helmets with distinctive crests, and to paint their shields with animals and the like. Coats of arms accompanied the development of surnames, becoming hereditary in the same way. Later instances of the name mention William Rudman, who witnessed a charter in Edinburgh in 1561, and Ann, daughter of Christopher Rudman who was baptised at St. James's, Clerkenwell, London in 1682. James Taylor and Elizabeth Ruddiman were married at St. George's, Hanover Square, London in 1760. Most of the European surnames were formed in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. The process had started somewhat earlier and had continued in some places into the 19th century, but the norm is that in the tenth and eleventh centuries people did not have surnames, whereas by the fifteenth century most of the population had acquired a second name. - http://www.4crests.com/rudman-coat-of-arms.html
