Anchitil de Grai, Lord of Rotherfield - De Grai Lineage

Hullo - I found that, in sharing a Adam Grise'path-we go back to de Grey - working back through that family, I think you will see full details, history, name, etc in the long biography of:
Henry de Grey of Greys Thurrock -

Sir Henry was the son of Richard de Grey (born Thurrock, Essex, c. 1140 and married c. 1157 [Wikipedia is not trustworthy on birth date or place]) and probably a great-grandson of Anchetil de Greye of Rotherfield Greys in Oxfordshire,,,,,,etc
Good luck - hope this helps! pkb.

So Sorry ! I have just noticed that I went for Grai, rather than Grise'(to whom I am not related!), However - you might just find some links between those variations of names - and so many of the families around England, etc.. are rooted in Normandy, anyway ! keep trying !

one more time! a general surname story, may have something of interest: http://www.surnamedb.com/Surname/Grice
I found Alexandre Grice, Canada - managed by Russell Edward Sweetser (geni member)
- you might approach him (French Canadians?) Bonne Chance .

Hi Pauline, yes from prior research I am aware the different variants of Gris, Grise, Grice and so on all derived from the same place. That being said it's hard to track them back to when/if they split from one specific family. All the Gris variants that are located in England seem to be able to trace their origins to the Norman Invasions. If true, I am trying to figure out what family in France they branched off from. That being said, I am more interested in the families that never left France, that have a last name variant of Gray. All the name variants I previously mentioned mean gray. It's my theory that they originated from one specific family. I am hoping to confirm that. For instance, I have no known connections in France. I can only go back to 1690 Canada. I am guessing that the name changed from something to Grise once my ancestor departed France for Canada. For now, I have no proof. But as mentioned before I would like to see if all the name variants (Gris, Le Gris, Grise, Grice, Grisset..) originated from the de Grai family. It would clear up a lot of folklore in my family, who just think the name was given to people who liked wearing gray or who were drunk (Grise in old French translates to the drunk) or who were pig farmers since Grice/Grice also refers to a specific boar. Hope that makes sense. Not expecting anyone to know all those details but it would be interesting is someone was able to link the De Grai's to the name variants.

As far as anyone has been able to figure out, and it isn't 100% certain, the Anglo-Norman Gray/Grey families originated in Graye-sur-mer, Normandy, France. (The theory that they trace back to the Croys of Picardy is undocumented and unverifiable.)

Sorting out who was related to and descended from whom has turned out to be a real hooraw's nest. Some of this is due to bad/wild guesses, some to confusion among similarly named relatives, and some to "we just don't know".

Familytreedna.com has a Y-DNA project for people with the last name Gray/Grey, or claiming to have connections to families of that name. They have over 20 haplotype groups, most of them very loose and ill-defined. What this means, obviously, is that there is no "one big Gray/Grey family", but that various people took the surname at various times for various reasons.

Out of the whole kaboodle, only *one* person claimed Croy/Grai descent:
175660 Gray Reynold de Croy/de Grey, 1058-1097, R-DF21- R-Z2186
(No paper trail was provided, so who knows if it's accurate.)