Research conducted by Dr Neil Cummins of LSE and Professor Gregory Clark at the University of California, Davis has revealed that English surnames have changed relatively little in the last 800 years.

Surnames such as Baskerville, Darcy, Mandeville, Montgomery, Neville, Percy, Punchard and Talbot have remained associated with wealth, power and the upper classes since the Norman Conquest of 1066.

The study goes on to compare the frequency of these ‘elite surnames’ in matriculation lists from Oxford and Cambridge in the period 1800 to 1829, to those found in the lists from 1980 to 2009. The results showed that “all these surname groups have a statistically significantly higher than average representation among Oxbridge students. Social status persists strongly.”

This is not to say that an ‘elite surname’ is a passport through the Oxbridge admissions process. However, there is a noteworthy trend. Students with surnames such as Darcy, Percy and Montgomery have been found at Oxbridge throughout the last 27 generations, originating from the vast development in surnames sparked by the influx of the French language from 1066 onwards.

From 1900 to 1913, nine of the most exclusive public schools, including Eton, Harrow and Rugby, provided 28 per cent of the Oxbridge intake. The Oxford entry exam, until 1940, included a compulsory Latin test. Barriers such as this obstructed working class students from the Oxbridge admissions process and thereby fostered the culture of the Oxbridge surname.

It was only in the 1980s that large scale efforts to equalise opportunities in the admissions process gained pace. Even now Cambridge and Oxford spend large amounts on access.

Despite this, the prevalence of these surnames persists today. Dr Cummins and Professor Clark concluded that the ratio of representation of these surnames, where 1 would represent a level of representation in line with the wider population, currently stands at 1.75 at Oxford and Cambridge.

They have attributed this to the way in which children generally inherit both their surname and their social status from their parents, meaning that the ‘elite surnames’ have remained closely associated with the upper classes.

Dr Cummins added: “Between 1800 and 2011 there have been substantial institutional changes in England, but no gain in rates of social mobility for society as a whole.” On the whole, surnames have remained static and particularly so at Oxford and Cambridge.