Grier
A Scottish surname that is usually a shortened form of Gregor or Gregory.
The #2,600 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 22,263 Americans shares it.
Etymology
The surname Grier is generally explained as a contraction of Gregor, and therefore as a shortened patronymic related to Gregory. Older sources also connect it with MacGregor, treating Grier as a reduced form of the same clan-based family name. In that tradition, the underlying sense is simply “son or descendant of Gregor/Gregory.”
History
19th-century surname writers repeatedly place Grier among Scottish forms related to Gregor, Greer, and Grierson. It appears in records as a family name in both Scotland and later English-speaking communities abroad, including North America. Some older authorities treated it as especially Scottish in character.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Several old surname dictionaries treat Grier and Greer as essentially the same family name in reduced form.
From the historical record
“GRIEF, See Grieve. GRIER. See Gregory. GRIERSON. The son of Gregor; de- scended from the clan Gregor. B.L.G. under Macadam. GRIEVE. A-Sax. gerefa, pra?ses, like the Germ. {iraf. In Scothind the manager of a farm, or superinteudent of anyAvork— a reeve. It has been A'ariously corrupted to Greive, Greaves, Greeves, &c.”
— Patronymica Britannica: a dictionary of the family names of the United Kingdom