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The cowley Surname

cowley Name Meaning and History

  1. English: habitational name from any of the various places called Cowley. One in Gloucestershire is named with Old English cu ‘cow’ + leah ‘woodland clearing’; two in Derbyshire have Old English col ‘(char)coal’ as the first element; and one near London has it from Old English cofa ‘shelter’, ‘bay’ (see Cove) or the personal name Cofa. The largest group, however, with examples in Buckinghamshire, Devon, Oxfordshire, and Staffordshire, were apparently named as ‘the wood or clearing of Cufa’; however, in view of the number of places named with this element, it is possible that it conceals a topographical term as well as a personal name.
  2. Irish: reduced form of Macaulay (see McCauley).

Dictionary of American Family Names, Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-508137-4
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The cowley name in History

A unique volume of fascinating facts, statistics and commentary following the cowley family name as far back in history as possible.

cowley Family Facts

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Distribution of cowley Families in the US in 1920
Number of cowley families
 61-120
 21-60		 1-20
 0
Compiled by Ancestry.com from the 1920 US Federal Census records

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Year

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