Haythornthwaite

Haythornthwaite is the name of the benefactor to whom Mr Norrell is indebted for his wealth and lands, granting him the leisure to study English magic [4].

We have it on the authority of Christopher Drawlight that Haythornthwaite was the uncle of Mr Norrell, who upon his decease "left him a world of money" [4].

While Mr Drawlight's information is not always so accurate as he likes to imply, he may be correct here, for Haythornthwaite is certainly a northern name.* Mr Norrell's mother might have been a Miss Haythornthwaite before her marriage — though of course it may be that in his eagerness to appear au courant Drawlight has only seized upon part of the truth: Haythornthwaite might equally well be a name that came into the Norrell family from an ancestress and was handed down as a forename, which is a common practice.^†

Lastly, it may also be that Mr Norrell's wealth came from another source entirely, and that he merely allowed it to be assumed that he had inherited his great fortune from a benevolent relation.

Notes

*. The name Haythornthwaite means something like "the clearing among the hawthorn trees."

†. If this latter speculation is correct, the name "Haythornthwaite Norrell" is indeed a formidable one.