Harold Family History

English: from the Middle English personal name Harold (Old Norse Haraldr borrowed from an ancient Germanic form Harjawald). Alternatively the name may arise from the Middle English personal name Harwold Harold (Old English Hereweald) particularly in Suffolk where there was also post-medieval confusion with Hurrell.

These all go back to an ancient Germanic personal name composed of the elements heri hari ‘army’ + wald ‘rule’ which is attested in Europe from an early date; the Roman historian Tacitus records a certain Cariovalda chief of the ancient Germanic tribe of the Batavi as early as the 1st century A. D. See also Herald.

English: habitational name from Harrold (Bedfordshire) from Old English hār ‘gray’ + wald ‘large tract of woodland high woodland’. Irish: this name is of direct Norse origin (see 1 above) but is also occasionally a variant of Harrell and Hurrell.

Spellings without final d have been adopted as the Anglicized form of the Gaelic Ó hEarghail (see Harrell). German: from a personal name equivalent to 1 above.