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SOUZA Family History

This interesting surname is of Portuguese origin, and is of locational derivation from any of the many minor places called Sousa or Souza in Portugal. The placename itself is of uncertain origin, but was probably applied originally to a salt marsh, from a variant of "sausa", salty (from the Latin "salsa"), with the word "agua", water (Latin "aqua") understood. The surname is also found as Sousa, Souza and D'Souza in the modern idiom, and is well recorded in Portuguese Church Registers, where it first appears in the early 15th Century (see below).