Origins of the Estacaille Surname

Spanish "Esta Calle" = This Street

What is the origin & history of the Estacaille surname?

Good question!

If you ask the question on the genealogy sites like Ancestry, AncientFaces, FamilySearch, etc. you won’t find much information. It is a rare name that is slowly dying out.

Let me start with the more modern spelling of the name, “Estacaille”. I’m often asked in Canada “how do you say it?” And my common response is, the English pronounce it “Est-a-caille” where the “caille” sounds similar to “pail”. But those with some fluency in French and Spanish, they pronounce it “Esta-a-cai” – the “lle” on the end of the name is silent. A similar example is the cartoon book based on a character called “Caillou” where the “ll” in the middle are silent, resulting in “cai-ou”.

As for the meaning? It roughly translates from Spanish to “this street”

During my years of research, and with the help of my French cousin Marie Jose Domecq, who is currently president of the Centre Genealogique des Pyrenees Atlantiques (CGPA), I’ve found records tracing my tree back to the early 1600s in France.

The name is found primarily in the Basque region of southern France. Filae.com and now MyHeritage.com are great resources for the birth/marriage/death & census records for the region. The highest concentrations of the surname are located in the Pyrenees Atlantique area at the very south of the country.

	Estacaille	Estecaille	Istacaille	Istecaille	Estaquaille	Estacalle	Totals
Pyrenees Atlantique, Nouvelle Aquitaine	899	353	173	38	16		1479
Hautes Pyrenees, Occitaine	1						1
Gironde, Nouvelle Aquitaine	5	1					6
Lot-Et-Garonne, Nouvelle Aquitaine	15						15
Charente, Nouvelle Aquitaine	1						1
L’Allier, Auvergne Rhone Alpes	5						5
Haute Corse, Corse		1					1
Paris, Ile-de-France		4					4
Seine-Saint-Denis, Il-de-France		1					1
Bas-Rhin, Grand-Est			1		1		2
Moselle, Grand-Est					1		1
Navarra, Spain						2	2
						Grand Total	1518

Did you know? The Basque prior to the mid 1800s were a matriarchalism society (I have a link coming up to a debate/discussion on the subject). Land and belongings were traditionally passed down to the eldest daughter. She would take on the duty of caring for her parents and other family members. It was fairly common practice at the time for her children to inherit her surname. Despite this, women did not have the power for voting, etc. You can read some of the discussion regarding matriarchalism on a great personal website for Basque culture, Buber’s Basque Page.

In my particular branch, I can trace back to my surname descending from a woman instead of a man, Marie ISTACAILLE de BAS, you can find her in the tree by viewing her profile here.

You will see some of the earlier ancestors have the addition of “de Bas” and “de Haut” suffixes on the surname. These are families that settled onto farms on the outskirts of the village Esquiule. There were two families that lived on the same hilly country road. One family lived closer to the bottom of the hill: “de bas” in French translates to “of bottom”. Another family lived at the top of the hill: “de haut” meaning “of above”. I visited this area in May 2020 with some of my French Domecq & Caubet cousins and managed to get a handful of photos of the former Istacaille farms before my camera broke.