Ansley
Usually a locational surname meaning “from Annesley” or a similar place-name ending in -ley.
The #9,038 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 85,407 Americans shares it.
Etymology
Ansley is generally treated as a place-based surname. The name is commonly linked with Annesley in Nottinghamshire, whose ending comes from Old English leah, meaning a wood, clearing, or meadow. The first element is usually taken as a personal name such as An(n), so the place-name would mean something like “An’s clearing.” Some writers also noted a possible connection with other English place-names in -ley, so the surname may have arisen more than once.
History
The historical sources mainly point to Annesley in Nottinghamshire as the best-known source, while also allowing for a possible North English local origin in some families. As with many English locational surnames, it would have been adopted by people who moved away from the original place and were identified by it. The surname is not very common today but survives in Britain, North America, and other English-speaking regions.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Some old surname indexes group Ansley with other -ley names because the second element is the very common Old English word for a clearing or meadow.
From the historical record
“tingham. But there is probably a north English local origin also. There is also Ansley, a parish in CO, Warwick. ' Dc Resinald' dc Aniilc? - . . in Aniidee,^ Hen. lll%liv. I; K. pTii, Notla and Drrbyiidie.”
— A Dictionary of English and Welsh Surnames, with special American instances