Colby
A habitational surname meaning “from Colby,” a place name found in England and elsewhere.
The #3,204 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 27,376 Americans shares it.
Etymology
Colby is a habitational surname taken from places called Colby, especially in Norfolk and Lincolnshire, and also recorded in other English counties. The place-name is usually explained as Old Norse elements meaning “Cole’s farm/settlement,” with the first element being a personal name, probably Cole, and the second element -by meaning “farmstead,” “village,” or “settlement.” Some older writers also connected the name with a Danish place-name, but the English locality explanation is the standard one in the sources here.
History
Medieval records show bearers styled “de Colby,” indicating origin from a place rather than a descriptive nickname. The surname later spread beyond its original localities and is now established in Britain and the United States. Because several English parishes and townships carry the name, the surname may have arisen independently in more than one family line.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
The place-name ending -by is a Scandinavian survival in English surnames and often points to Viking-age settlement.
From the historical record
“COLBURN. See Colbourn. COLBY. A parish in Norfolk, and a township in Westmoreland. COLCHESTER. The town in Essex. COLCLOUGH. An estate in StalTord- shire, in which county the family resided temp. Edw. III. The L-ish branch settled at Tintern, co. "Wexford, about the middle of the XVI. cent. COLD. A corruption of Cole.”
— Patronymica Britannica: a dictionary of the family names of the United Kingdom