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The goal of this project is to research the family tree of the Davis family.
English and Welsh: patronymic meaning ‘Dafydd's (son)’ equivalent to Welsh ap Dafydd the Welsh form of David . The spelling Davis is more typical in southwestern England northwards as far as Lancashire where the frequency of the surname largely reflects Welsh migration but may sometimes represent a native English surname based on Davy (compare Davies ). Davis (including in the sense 2 below) is the eighth most frequent surname in the US. It is also very common among African Americans. Irish and Scottish: adopted for Gaelic Mac Daibhéid ‘son of David’; see McDevitt . Compare Davies . In some cases also an Americanized form (actually an adoption of the name in 1 above) of Jewish Davidovich and of its cognate Davidsohn.
Source: Dictionary of American Family Names 2nd edition, 2022