Troup
A Scottish surname most often taken from a place-name, with some older writers also linking it to a word for a farm or village.
The #8,951 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 84,426 Americans shares it.
Etymology
The strongest historical treatment in the sources connects Troup to a place-name in Scotland, especially Troup in Banffshire or the Troup lands in Perthshire. Older surname dictionaries also relate it to northern place-name elements such as the Scandinavian word torp, meaning a small farm or settlement, which often appears in English and Scottish place-names as -thorp, -thrope, or similar forms. Because of that, the surname is best understood as locational: someone called Troup was originally identified by their connection with a place called Troup.
History
The name is recorded in Scottish family history, especially in Perthshire, where Lower notes an ancient family of Troup of that ilk. Later surname writers repeatedly treat the name as Scottish and locational, and some also point to Banffshire place-name evidence. In English and American usage, the surname is uncommon but established, and it has occasionally been extended or altered into related forms such as Troop or Droop in older records.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Some 19th-century surname writers grouped Troup with names built on the old northern place-name element -thorp/-trup, a reminder that many surnames began as labels for where a family lived.
From the historical record
“TROOP ) (A.-Scand.) metath. var. ofThorp(e, TROPE V q.v. (Mod. Scand. torp, a farm, also TROUP J occurs in place-names as -trup). Cp. Throop. TROSTON (A.-Scand.) Bel. to Troston (Suff.), the A.-Sax. Trosting\a\tiin = the Estate OF THE Trost(a Family [the pers. name is a form of O.N. traiist-r, trusty, firm ; f.…”
— Surnames of the United Kingdom: a concise etymological dictionary (2 vols in 1)