WDYT?

[hotchpot.livejournal.com]

I've been doing family genealogy lately and there are several generations that feature the boy's name "Drury." My great great great great great grandparents, James McDearmon and Mary Daniel were married by a man named Drury Lacy, and they gave the name to a son, who gave it to his son, etc, etc on down the line.

I think its prounounced like DRUR-y rather than DREW-ry. I've never heard this name before except in a nursery rhyme (Do you know the muffin man...who lives in Drury lane?) I'd probably never use it but I thought it was interesting.

There was no entry on behindthename but I did find this:

Drury is a Norman name, possibly derived from the former village of Rouvray, near Rouen, Normandy. The name "de Rouvray" may have been shortened to Drury over time. Another explanation that has been published is that Drury meant "lover" in Old French or "Pearl" in Saxon. Although romantic possibilities, they are probably inaccurate. A third, and more likely, origin is that the name of Drieu of Normandy (and later of St. Edmunds), our earliest Drury ancestor, was extended to Drury when surnames were adopted in the thirteenth century.