Large is an English surname, with variants including, but not limited to Lardge, Lurge, and Larg. Its meaning is variable, though it may derive from the Norman French adjective, large (meaning "generous" or "big" ), as it is found in the surname "le Large" in English records dating back as far as the 13th century. Harrison's work on English surnames gives the following: "LARGE (adjectival: French, Latin) BIG; GENEROUS abundant, liberal]"
He gives an early citation for the name: Austin Belz from the Hundred Rolls, a reference dating to 1273.
He also provides a quotation showing the word in its older sense of generous, full, liberal or ample in its literary context:
So large of yift and free was she (from Chaucer's Romance of the Rose I168)
Another variant surname, "de Large", appears to be continental European rather than English in origin.
Henry Brougham Guppy's survey circa 1881, based on local British directories, places Large as a surname local to North Wiltshire, and considers it to have particular prevalence among yeoman farmers.(Guppy, 1890)
According to the International Genealogical Index, the surname is also found in many other English counties; in Ireland, Scotland, Wales and other English language countries; in France and Germany, and, more rarely, in the Scandinavian countries. Large is also found in Latin America countries such as Colombia where all families surnamed Large are related.
People with the name Large, or one of its variants, include:
Read more about Large: People
Famous quotes containing the word large:
“I am convinced that ... we have reestablished confidence. Wages should remain stable. A very large degree of industrial unemployment and suffering which would otherwise have occurred has been prevented.”
—Herbert Hoover (1874–1964)
“The question for the country now is how to secure a more equal distribution of property among the people. There can be no republican institutions with vast masses of property permanently in a few hands, and large masses of voters without property.... Let no man get by inheritance, or by will, more than will produce at four per cent interest an income ... of fifteen thousand dollars] per year, or an estate of five hundred thousand dollars.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)
“Unionism seldom, if ever, uses such power as it has to insure better work; almost always it devotes a large part of that power to safeguarding bad work.”
—H.L. (Henry Lewis)