# Thornley (surname)

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

A habitational surname from Old English.

| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Origin | English |
| Type | place, taken from where an ancestor lived or came from |
| People in the US (2010 Census) | 1,725 |
| US rank (2010) | 16,624 of 162,253 |
| How often | about 1 in every 178,983 people |
| Change since 2000 | +7.5% (1,604 in 2000) |
| Pronunciation | not recorded |
| Variant spellings | Thorneloe |

## Etymology

From Old English þorn (“thorn, thorny bush”) + lēah (“woodland clearing, glade”). Equivalent to thorn + -ley (“lea”).

## Who carries it

Share of people named Thornley 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) | 94% |
| Black (not Hispanic) | 1.7% |
| Hispanic or Latino (any race) | 1.5% |
| Two or more races | 1.9% |

## Where

Wikidata records people named Thornley in the United Kingdom.

## People named Thornley

- Callum Thornley, British cyclist

## Similar surnames

Thornell, Thornhill, Trammell, Trammel, Tramel, Tremmel, Trenholm.

## 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.