Rowles
A surname that usually developed as a variant of Rolles, ultimately tied to a place-name or the name Roll/Rolle.
The #9,846 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 93,958 Americans shares it.
Etymology
Rowles is generally treated as a spelling variant of Rolles, itself connected with the personal name Roll or Rolle. In medieval English records, forms ending in -s often worked as genitives, so the surname could mean "of Roll/Rolle" or "belonging to Roll." Some 19th-century writers also linked it to French place-names such as Rouelles or Reuilly, but the core explanation is usually the same family of Roll/Rolle forms.
History
The surname appears in medieval and early modern English records in several spellings, including Rowles, Rolles, and Rowle. It was especially noted in southern English records such as Devon and Somerset, and later spread more widely. By the 19th and 20th centuries, Rowles had become established as a standard hereditary surname in English-speaking countries.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Older surname dictionaries explicitly gloss Rowles as a form of Rolles, showing how fluid English surname spelling could be in medieval and early modern records.
From the historical record
“Roulet (and Roullet) and Roulot are fairly common. ROWLES, a var. of Rolles, q.v. ROWLEY (Eng.) Bel. to Rowley = i the Rough Lea [M.E. rou, rowi etc., O.E. rAh, roiigh, wild + M.E. ley, etc., O.E. ledh, a meadow] 2 the Roe-Lea [M.E.w, O.E. rd, a roe + M.E. ley, etc., O.E. ledh, a meadow]”
— Surnames of the United Kingdom: a concise etymological dictionary (2 vols in 1)