There is in Yorkshire a placename, "Mankinholes," which identifies an area of caverns not uncommon in the Pennine hills of that region, where "mankin holes" appear to have been made or inhabited by mankins now gone, and leaving deep pits or openings descending to connected caverns in the ground. "Mankin holes" are often quite deep, such as the well-known, "Witches Cave" which is many hundreds of feet in depth. In other sources, the Celtic meaning is that "mankinholes" are defined as air pockets in bread, giving one the impression or superstition that something or someone was living there. Mankinholes in Yorkshire is related to that superstition.
The surname "Mankin" is found in parish records of this West Riding area of Yorkshire in the township of Langfield, and parish of Halifax where we shall later examine in detail in search of our English or Scottish roots. Yorkshire borders Scotland, and Mankin (Manchan)is a typical Scottish surname in form, as in Rankin, Hankin, etc. Coupled with the fact that the Mankin clan is found arriving in America with the extended family of the Lords of Baltimore who became great barons in Yorkshire, settling in their American colony, and shipping Scottish prisoners captured there in the 1715 Jacobite Rebellion, one can easily assume that Yorkshire is a likely place of origin of the Port Tobacco branch of Mankin in America. Most likely, "Mankinholes" (also written "Mancknowles" in Lancashire) was shortened to "Mankin".

Variations in spelling range from Manken, Mankyn, Mankins, and other possible origins of the name could indicate derivation from the Irish Mangin, Moneghan and the Scottish religious name Manchan, the latter a Celtic reference to the 9^th century St. Manchan whose golden reliquary of bones are in Offaly, Ireland.

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