25,448 Global FORREST Family Members

FORREST Family History

This name derives from the Olde French "forest", (Late Latin "forestis", a derivative of "foris" meaning "outside"). The reference was originally to the woods around a manor house, and the surname was either topographic for someone who lived in or near a royal forest, or occupational for a keeper or worker in one. The Medieval English word "forest" referred specifically to the large tracts of woodland reserved for the purposes of hunting by the King and his nobles. The surname is first recorded in the early 13th Century, (see below). One, Adam ate Forest appears in the "Subsidy Rolls of Kent", dated 1300...