Earley
A surname most often taken from a place-name, especially Earley in Berkshire, rather than from the adjective “early.”
The #3,518 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 30,448 Americans shares it.
Etymology
Earley is generally understood as a locational surname, from Earley in Berkshire (historically associated with the parish of Sonning). The place-name is Old English in origin and likely means something like “eagle wood/clearing” or a related woodland place-name, though the exact interpretation is not perfectly certain. The surname would have been adopted by people who moved away from that place and were identified by it.
History
19th-century surname writers explicitly treated Earley as a local surname from the Berkshire place-name, and they also noted the shorter spelling Early as a later variant or imitative form. The name is found in English records and later in British and overseas directories and censuses. In modern usage it survives mainly as a family name rather than as a common given-name-derived spelling.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Older surname collections often grouped Earley with other place-derived names from small English settlements, which can make it look deceptively like the everyday word “early.”
From the historical record
“Earlsy, Sttrly.— Local, ' Earley,' a parish in dioc. Oxford. Lower says, ' A liberty in the parish of Sonning, co. Berks.' The fom Early without the e in the seconi syllable is, of course, imitative and indeed the entry ;”
— A Dictionary of English and Welsh Surnames, with special American instances