Greenfield meaning | Last name Greenfield origin

Variation of Grenville. The Grenvilles of Wootton, county of Bucks, descend from Richard de Grenville, who came in with the Conqueror in the train of Walter Giffard, earl of Longueville and Buckingham, whose son in law he was. The name, which has been variously written, Greynevile, Greinville, Granville, etc., and latinized De Granavilla, was doubtless borrowed from Granville, the well-known seaport of Lower Normandy. The Grenvilles of the West are of the same stock. George G. of Stowe, in Cornwall, the poetical Lord Lansdowne, writing in 1711 to his nephew, Wm. Henry, Earl of Bath, says: "Your ancestors for at least five hundred years never made any alliances, male or female, out of the western counties: thus there is hardly a gentleman either in Cornwall or Devon, but has some of your blood, as you of theirs." Quart. The G.'s of the Buckinghamshire Stowe could boast of a still longer territorial stability.

The more correct form of the name is Granville, the spelling now and anciently used for the town. George Grenville, in his letter to his kinsman Charles, Lord Lansdowne, on the bombardment of the town of Granville, in Normandy, by the English fleet, alludes to the arms of Gran ville as till then preserved over one of the gates of that town:-
"Those arms which for nine centuries (?) have braved
The wrath of time, on antique stone engraved,
Now torn by mortars, stand yet undefaced
On nobler trophies, by thy valour raised.
Safe on thy eagle's wingsthey soar above
The rage of war or thunder to remove;
Borne by the bird of Cæsar and of Jove."

The allusion here is to his lordship's creation as a Count of the Empire, the family arms to be thenceforth borne on the breast of the imperial eagle. It seems singular that the noble family should have tolerated the spelling Grenville, though Clarendon goes even further, and writes Greenvil, passim. A still grosser corruption brings the great town (grande ville) to the level of a Green-field. There is, however, a locality in Normandy which appears really to have experienced this metamorphosis, for of another Granville there runs a proverb:-
"Granville grand villain!
Une égliseet un moulin,
On voit Granville tout à plein."

Variation of Granville. See Grenville - The Grenvilles of Wootton, county of Bucks, descend from Richard de Grenville, who came in with the Conqueror in the train of Walter Giffard, earl of Longueville and Buckingham, whose son in law he was. The name, which has been variously written, Greynevile, Greinville, Granville, etc., and latinized De Granavilla, was doubtless borrowed from Granville, the well-known seaport of Lower Normandy. The Grenvilles of the West are of the same stock. George G. of Stowe, in Cornwall, the poetical Lord Lansdowne, writing in 1711 to his nephew, Wm. Henry, Earl of Bath, says: "Your ancestors for at least five hundred years never made any alliances, male or female, out of the western counties: thus there is hardly a gentleman either in Cornwall or Devon, but has some of your blood, as you of theirs." Quart. The G.'s of the Buckinghamshire Stowe could boast of a still longer territorial stability.

The more correct form of the name is Granville, the spelling now and anciently used for the town. George Grenville, in his letter to his kinsman Charles, Lord Lansdowne, on the bombardment of the town of Granville, in Normandy, by the English fleet, alludes to the arms of Gran ville as till then preserved over one of the gates of that town:-
"Those arms which for nine centuries (?) have braved
The wrath of time, on antique stone engraved,
Now torn by mortars, stand yet undefaced
On nobler trophies, by thy valour raised.
Safe on thy eagle's wingsthey soar above
The rage of war or thunder to remove;
Borne by the bird of Cæsar and of Jove."

The allusion here is to his lordship's creation as a Count of the Empire, the family arms to be thenceforth borne on the breast of the imperial eagle. It seems singular that the noble family should have tolerated the spelling Grenville, though Clarendon goes even further, and writes Greenvil, passim. A still grosser corruption brings the great town (grande ville) to the level of a Green-field. There is, however, a locality in Normandy which appears really to have experienced this metamorphosis, for of another Granville there runs a proverb:-
"Granville grand villain!
Une égliseet un moulin,
On voit Granville tout à plein."

Dweller at the verdant field or pasture.

Green field.

A Lincolnshire hamlet. Also a corruption of Grenville or Granville.