Grizzle Family History

Americanized form of French or Swiss French Grisel ‘gray’ or of its rare variant Grizel. English (Hertfordshire): nickname from Middle English (Old French) grisel ‘gray(-haired)’ also used as a term for an old man.

English: occasionally perhaps from the Middle English female personal name Grisil(d) (perhaps of ancient Germanic origin) but it is attested very rarely in medieval England and probably too late to be the source of a surname in the English Midlands.

It was made familiar through the heroine of Chaucer's Clerk's Tale, a re-writing of an Italian folk tale in versions by Boccaccio and Petrarch, but the personal name is earlier than the publication of Chaucer's work.

In some cases also an Americanized form of Croatian Grizelj: nickname derived from gristi ‘to bite’ figuratively ‘to nag someone’.