Graves
An English surname that most often began as a form of Grave, linked to a grove, a boundary, or a place-name rather than an actual burial ground.
The #371 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 3,668 Americans shares it.
Etymology
This surname is usually treated as a variant or pluralized form of Grave. In the older English name tradition, Grave could point to a grove or wooded place, or in some cases to a local place-name built on that word. Some 19th-century writers also connected it with a personal name or with words related to a ditch or hollow, so the exact source can vary by family line.
History
The name appears in medieval records in forms such as de la Grava, and later English surname collections treat Graves as a regular surname derived from Grave. It became established in England and then spread widely overseas, especially to North America. Because several different words and place-names could lie behind the same spelling, family origins are not always the same.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Some early surname writers thought Graves was simply a spelling/plural variant of Grave, which is why the two names are often grouped together in old dictionaries.
From the historical record
“See Grave. GRAVES. See Grave, 4. GRAVETT. A little Grove. GRAY. See Grey. GRAYGOOSE. A sobriquet. The name Greengoose is also found. It is pro- bable that the two appellations originated in the same locality and Avcre somewhat auti-”
— Patronymica Britannica: a dictionary of the family names of the United Kingdom