Wylie
A surname with more than one likely origin: often a nickname for a crafty or tricky person, but sometimes a later spelling of Wiley or a local surname form.
The #2,993 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 25,783 Americans shares it.
Etymology
The surname Wylie is usually treated as a variant of Wiley. In some cases it seems to come from Old English wil, meaning a trick, stratagem, or wile, giving the sense of a crafty or sly person. Other bearers may have inherited it as a regional or spelling variant of the same name, especially in English and Scots records.
History
Historical surname dictionaries often link Wylie with Wiley and note that the spelling was not fixed, so forms like Wylly, Wyllie, and Wyly appear in older records. The name is especially familiar in Scotland and northern England, where such spelling variation was common. Because the etymology is sometimes mixed with the surname Wiley, exact family origins can differ from line to line.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Older surname writers sometimes glossed the name simply as “wily” or “sly,” reflecting the nickname sense they saw behind it.
From the historical record
“2 a diphthongized form of Wills, q.v. WILEY (Eng.) i = Wylie, q.v. 2 Wily, Sly . [f. O.E. wil, a wile] WILFORD (Eng.) Bel. to Wilford (Notts), 13th cent. Wyleford, Wylleford, late 12th cent.”
— Surnames of the United Kingdom: a concise etymological dictionary (2 vols in 1)