# Barley (surname)

Source: https://namelineage.com/surname/barley/  
Publisher: Name Lineage. Counts from the US Census Bureau; origin and etymology from Wiktionary; bearers from Wikidata. Data updated 2026-11-11.

A surname.

| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Origin | English |
| Type | not recorded |
| People in the US (2010 Census) | 4,744 |
| US rank (2010) | 7,054 of 162,253 |
| How often | about 1 in every 65,081 people |
| Change since 2000 | +4.0% (4,562 in 2000) |
| Pronunciation | not recorded |
| Variant spellings | none recorded |

## Etymology

* The village in Hertfordshire is from "Beora's ley," from *Beora + -ley (“clearing, lea”). The former is a personal name from Old English bera (“bear”). * The village in Lancashire is from Old English bar (“boar”) or bere (“barley”) + leah (“clearing”). * As an English surname, from the noun barley. As a south German surname, spelling variant of Behrle, Beerli, themselves related to the noun bear.

## Who carries it

Share of people named Barley in the 2010 US Census by the Census's own race and ethnicity groups. The Census suppresses a share when the count behind it is small.

| Group | Share |
|---|---|
| White (not Hispanic) | 74% |
| Black (not Hispanic) | 19% |
| Hispanic or Latino (any race) | 2.5% |
| Asian and Pacific Islander | 0.5% |
| American Indian and Alaska Native | 1.4% |
| Two or more races | 2.0% |

## Where

Wikidata records people named Barley in the United Kingdom.

## People named Barley

- Nigel Barley, British anthropologist

## Similar surnames

Barlow, Burley, Barela, Briley, Brawley, Braley, Baril, Barile, Bauerle, Barrell, Byerly, Burrell.

## How to read these numbers

A Census count is people alive and counted in 2010, not births, and names occurring fewer than 100 times are not published at all. Ethnicity shares are the Census's own categories.