Skip to main content

Updated June 9, 2019

Family name origins & meanings

  • English : nickname for a gray-haired man, from Middle English grice, gris ‘gray’ (Old French gris, apparently of Germanic origin, and probably a distant cognate of Gray 1).
  • English : from Middle English grice, grise ‘pig’ (Old Norse gríss, probably akin to 1), hence a metonymic occupational name for a swineherd or a nickname.
  • English : Possibly an Americanized spelling of German Greis.

Join the Family

Your partner in parenting from baby name inspiration to college planning.

Subscribe