The Terry Surname

“Terry” is a surname of pre 5th Century Gallic origin - derived from the personal name “Thierri”, in turn derived from the ancient Germanic “Theodoric”, a compound of “theudo” meaning “people or race” and “ric” meaning “of power”.

Before the Norman Conquest of Britain (1066) people in England did not use hereditary surnames. Within their small communities, they could easily be identified by a personal name or a nickname. However, as the size of communities increased it became necessary to differentiate between people with similar names, leading to names such as Henry the weaver, Joan of the meadow, Roger the short, Samuel son of Richard, and so on. After 1066 the Norman barons introduced surnames into England, and the practice gradually spread until by 1400 most English families had adopted their use. Initially surnames were changed or dropped at will, but eventually they became fixed and hereditary. The origin of most surnames is found in trades, locations of origin, and a father’s personal name or nickname (which is thought to be the case for Terry).

In the absence of definite rules of spelling, and under the combined influences of Latin, French, German, Celtic, and Old and Middle English the spelling variations of names were extreme. In the middle ages scribes generally spelled words by how they sounded, and it was the rule rather than the exception that the same person would be referred to by different spellings in different documents – and even occasionally within the same document! The “Terry” surname has been recorded in over one hundred variations in English, Irish, Scottish, French, and German. From the variant “Thierry” arising out of the Rhine Valley in France, in Britain the name has transitioned through Tedric, Tericus, Terrick, and Terye until finally becoming more or less standardized as Terry or Terrey by about 1700. English language variations which have been recorded in documents that have survived to the present day include Terry, Terrye, Terrey, Tarry, Torry, Tyrry, and of course all of their homonyms ending in both “i” and “ie”.

The name first entered England during the Norman Conquest of 1066. The variations Theodricus, Tedricus, and Teodericus appear as (Latinized) personal names (hereditary surnames not being in use at the time) in the Domesday Book of 1088. The name also makes an early appearance in Kent, where in 1138 Thierry, son of Deorman of London was granted lands by Gilbert, Earl of Pembroke, and persisted in tenancy under Richard FitzGilbert of Clare. In 1166, a certain Terri Vsuarius is mentioned in the Pipe Roles of Norfolk, and the name is first recorded as a family surname in 1199 when Ralph Teri is entered into the “Register of the Freemen of the City of Leicester” in the final year of the reign of King Richard 1st of England. Other early examples include John Terry of Warwickshire (1221), Thomas Therry of Somerset (1243), and Hugo Tyry of Befordshire (1250). From military records we also have: William Terry, Man-at-Arms to Geoffrey Sterling (1374); Roger Terry, Esquire Man-at-Arms to Thomas de Mowbray Earl of Nottingham (1388); John Terry, Yeoman Archer under Michael de la Pole Earl of Suffolk (1399); Piers Terry, Archer under Sir Thomas Erpingham with Henry V in an expedition to France (1415). In 1408 Thomas Terry, Canon of Wells, made his will within which he names his brother John Terry together with his brothers wife and two daughters.

The name entered Ireland with the family Terri as a consequence of the Anglo-Norman invasion of 1169-1170, and the families of Tyrry, Tirry, and Therry have been closely associated with the regions of Cork and Kilkenny from that time, while the families of Torrie and Torry have been associated with the region of Waterford. In Scotland, the first instance of the Terry surname occurs with a record regarding a Johannes Terry in the register of the abbey of Arbroath in 1475.