Ayres/Ayers Family Genealogy And Variants

Ayres
English: variant spelling of Ayers.
Dictionary of American Family Names, Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-508137-4

Ayers
English: derivative of Ayer. The -s most probably represents a trace of the Latin nominative singular in heres ‘heir’, but it may also signify the son or servant of someone known as ‘the heir’, i.e. someone who was heir to some great estate.
Dictionary of American Family Names, Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-508137-4

Ayer
English: from Middle English eir, eyer ‘heir’ (Old French (h)eir, from Latin heres ‘heir’). Forms such as Richard le Heyer were frequent in Middle English, denoting a man who was well known to be the heir to the main property in a particular locality, either one who had already inherited or one with great expectations.
Dictionary of American Family Names, Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-508137-4

Ayre
English: variant spelling of Ayer.
Dictionary of American Family Names, Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-508137-4

English Origin
The surname Ayers was most likely brought to England in the wake of the Norman Conquest of 1066. The name is thought to be derived from the Old French "eir," which is itself derived from the Latin "heres," meaning "heir."

Spelling variations of this family name include: Eyre, Eyer, Eyers, Eayres, Eyres, Ayer, Ayers,Heyer, Ayr, Air, Aires, Hyer, Hayer, Hoyer and many more.

First found in Derbyshire, where the ancestral home of the main branch of the Ayers family is thought to be located. Early written records of the name Ayers have been found in many counties, notably Derbyshire, Wiltshire, and Shropshire.

Some of the first settlers of this family name or some of its variants were: Eleazer Eyre, who brought his family to New Hampshire in 1620; John Ayer, who arrived in Massachusetts in 1640; Temperance Hyer, who came to Virginia in 1650.

Scottish Origin
In ancient Scotland, Ayers was a Strathclyde-Briton name for someone who lived in the city of Ayr in South-Western Scotland.

Prior to the first dictionaries, scribes spelled words according to sound. This, and the fact that Scottish names were repeatedly translated from Gaelic to English and back, contributed to the enormous number of spelling variations in Scottish names. Ayers has been spelled Ayer, Air, Ayre, Ayers and others.

First found in Ayrshire, where the family has been seated from ancient times. One of the first on record was Reginald Ayr, who was Clerk of Ayr in 1287 and Albinus Ayr had a charter of lands from King Robert the Bruce in 1315.

In such difficult times, the difficulties of raising the money to cross the Atlantic to North America did not seem so large compared to the problems of keeping a family together in Scotland.It was a journey well worth the cost, since it was rewarded with land and freedom the Scots could not find at home. The American War of Independence solidified that freedom, and many of those settlers went on to play important parts in the forging of a great nation. Among them: John Ayer, who was on record in Massachusetts in 1635; Simon Ayer, his wife Dorothy and their eight children, who all settled in Massachusetts in 1635.