Curtis
An Irish surname of Dublin. In the 2010 US census it was carried by 101,801 people, the 309th most common surname in the country.
Curtis is the anglicised form of three distinct Irish names. Some you can hear in the English name; others look and sound nothing like it, and were simply swapped for it.
Cuirtéis
de Cuirtéis
Mac Cruitín, son of Cruitín (hunch-backed). This family stood in Co. Clare.
Where the name comes from
de Cuirtéis is the Norman le Curteis: the courteous, one of courtly manners. It is of record here since the 13th century.
Mac Cruitín, son of Cruitín, the hunch-backed, is a different name that lands close by. It belonged to a learned family of antiquaries in Thomond whose patrimony (the land a family held by inheritance) was Carrowduff and Laghvally in Co. Clare, and a branch settled in East Limerick before 1600. Andrew MacCurtin, in the early part of the 18th century, was one of the best Irish scholars of his time.
Dublin, photographed
Photographs made in Dublin.
Dublin
Dublin is a county as well as a city. The bay has Howth at the north end and Killiney Hill at the south, the Muglins are a pair of rocks off Dalkey, and the Dublin Mountains start about half an hour from the city centre.
Notable bearers
Tony Curtis (1925-2010), actor, writer, and military officer.
Jamie Lee Curtis (born 1958), actor, writer, and photographer.
Charles Curtis (1860-1936), politician, lawyer, and prosecutor.
Ian Curtis (1956-1980), singer, musician, and composer.
Richard Curtis (born 1956), film actor, writer, and screenwriter.
About this page
The counties on this page are where the name was thickest on the ground in Ireland a century and a half ago, not a claim about any one family. Names moved around inside the country as much as they left it. The photographs are mine, made in the counties named.
More Irish surnames: Williams · Davis · Edwards · Cooper · Kelly · Cox · Brooks · Wood · James · Price · Butler · Jordan
How common the name was
In 1890, 23 births were registered under Curtis in Ireland, most of them in Dublin.
| Leinster | 20 | 87% |
|---|---|---|
| Munster | 2 | 9% |
| Ulster | 1 | 4% |
| Connacht | no figure printed | |
| Ireland | 23 |