Cowley Family History

English: habitational name from any of various places called Cowley. One in Gloucestershire is named with Old English cū ‘cow’ + lēah ‘woodland clearing’; two in Derbyshire have Old English col ‘(char)coal’ as the first element; and one near London is from Old English cofa ‘shelter bay’ (see Cove) or the personal name Cofa.

The largest group however with examples in Buckinghamshire, Devon, Oxfordshire, and Staffordshire were apparently named as ‘the wood or clearing of Cufa’; however, in view of the number of places called with this element, it is possible that it conceals a topographic term as well as a personal name.

Irish: shortened form of Macaulay (see McCauley).

Manx: shortened form of Gaelic Mac Amhlaoibh ‘son of Amhlaoibh’ (a Gaelicized form of Old Norse Óláfr).

For an alternative Manx form of the same patronymic see Callow.