Ratliff Family History

English (Suffolk): habitational name from one or more of the places so named such as Radcliffe (Lancashire), Radcliffe on Trent and Ratcliffe on Soar (both Nottinghamshire), Radclive (Buckinghamshire), Ratcliffe Culey and Ratcliffe on the Wreake (both Leicestershire), Ratclyffe in Clyst Hydon, Ratcliffes in Thorverton, and Ratcliffes in Broad Clyst (all Devon), Ratcliff in Stepney (Middlesex), and Rackley in Compton Bishop (Somerset).

The placenames derive from Old English rēad ‘red’ + clif ‘cliff, bank, steep slope’ (see also Rutley). A family of the name Radcliffe trace their descent from Sir Nicholas de Radclyffe.

He is said to have been a knight who held the major of Radcliffe in Lancashire and served Roger de Poitou, Baron de Marsey in the 11th century.