Smedley

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A English surname of Old English origin, also used as a given name, borne by many people across Britain and elsewhere
2. A family name of English origin that is also occasionally given as a first name to a person
3. An English surname with roots in medieval England, sometimes used as a personal first name

Etymology: Smedley is an English surname, and its most likely source is a place name rather than a person's trade or nickname. The name is thought to come from Old English "smēþe", meaning "smooth", combined with "lēah", meaning "woodland clearing" or "glade". A family taking its name from a smooth, open clearing would have been identifying itself by where it lived, which was how many English surnames formed. The "perhaps" in that origin matters: the combination is a reasonable reconstruction from the two elements, but it is not firmly documented, so the name's exact starting point remains an educated guess. Its two parts, though, are plain words that were in everyday use in Old English, so the meaning of the combined name is easy to recover.