What Does The Last Name Wiley mean?

Question

Does anyone know what the last name WILEY means...and where they originated in??and there history please help if you can

thanx

Answer 1

There's an excellent article on the name at (surprise!) wileygenealogy.com. Here's the key part:


"The word comes to us from Old Norse spoken in Britton and Scotland in the 9th and 10th centuries A.D. and was used to describe the little red dog-like animal known today as the fox. In the 10th and 11th centuries the word is found in Middle English and again used to describe the fox. In the 13th century the word "wile" or "wyle" means "crafty or sly, like a fox". There is no doubt that the word meant a fox or to be like a fox.

"Nithsdale, from a height near DalswintonThe first time it appears as a surname is in 1355 Scotland when Donald Wyle of Dalswinton registered his lands in Nithsdale, on the River Nith. Dalswinton was a town in the area and lies between the present day towns of Thornhill and Dumfries in Dumfrieshire in the Galloway District of the Southern Uplands of Scotland."

http://www.wileygenealogy.com/library/learning/wyliename.phtml

Answer 2

Dances like a coyote.