Cory
A surname most often explained as local, from a place-name meaning a round hollow or winding valley.
The #5,867 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 52,517 Americans shares it.
Etymology
The name is commonly linked to a Scottish place-name such as Corrie or Cury, and ultimately to Celtic words for a round hollow, bend, or winding stream. Writers have connected it with Gaelic and Welsh forms meaning a circle, dell, or glen, or with a term for a hollow between hills. In some traditions it is treated as a shortened form of Curry/Curie from a Cornish parish name; in others, as the surname of someone who came from a corrie-shaped place.
History
19th-century surname writers usually classed Cory as a Scottish or western-British local surname, and several later dictionaries point to place-names in Scotland or Cornwall. The surname also appears in Irish records, where it may sometimes overlap with related forms such as Conry/Corry or other Gaelic names. Because several nearby surnames and place-names look similar, historical sources do not always agree on a single origin for every family line.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Some older etymologists thought the name had to do with a ‘corrie’—a mountain hollow or bowl-shaped valley—rather than a family occupation or personal name.
From the historical record
“Curteis. CORY. The same as Corrie. CORYTON. An estate in Lifton, co. Devon, possessed l.)y the family as early at least as 1242. C. S. Gilbert's Cornwall. COSBY. A parish and estate co. Lei- cester, said to have been the property of the family before the Conquest. COSCAR. See Mac Oscar.”
— Patronymica Britannica: a dictionary of the family names of the United Kingdom