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Fields surname meaning

An English topographic surname for someone who lived by or worked around open fields.

Confidence
Likely
US frequency
Rank 298 · 103,194 people
Common variants
Field, Felde, Fields, Fieldes

Confidence: Likely. The main story is well supported; some details of the deeper root are less certain.

The short story

Fields is commonly a topographic surname for someone who lived near open fields or came from a place described that way. Field, Felde, Fieldes, and Fields show the spelling and number variation of medieval and early modern records. In some families the same word could suggest work connected with farmland, but that does not turn every Fields line into an occupational surname. The landscape term is the most useful shared clue, while separate English, Scottish, and immigrant histories can converge in American records. Place is the catalog lead, with likely confidence for the overlapping routes.

Also seen as: Field, Felde, Fields, Fieldes

Sources used
  • Ancestry, Dictionary of American Family Names entry 'Fields' (topographic and occupational routes)
  • Wikipedia 'Fields (surname)' (field-based surname history)
  • Names2020_LastNames_RaceHispanic_Top1000.xlsx (2020 Census)