indicate the level to which a name has been verified.
Type Surname (from nickname)
Other Forms FormsFaire, Fayre, Fayer, Phair, Fhinn, Fionn
Meaning & History
English: nickname meaning ‘handsome’, ‘beautiful’, ‘fair’, from Middle English fair, fayr, Old English fæger. The word was also occasionally used as a personal name in Middle English, applied to both men and women.
Irish: translation of Gaelic fionn ‘fair’, which Woulfe describes as ‘a descriptive epithet that supplanted the real surname’, or a reduced Anglicized form of Gaelic Mac Finn, a variant of Mag Fhinn (see McGinn).
Irish: translation of Gaelic fionn ‘fair’, which Woulfe describes as ‘a descriptive epithet that supplanted the real surname’, or a reduced Anglicized form of Gaelic Mac Finn, a variant of Mag Fhinn (see McGinn).