Family name origins & meanings
- Irish (of English origin) : habitational name from Dovedale in Derbyshire, ‘valley (Middle English dale) of the river Dove’ (see Dove 1).
- Irish : English surname adopted by bearers of Gaelic Ó Dubhdáleithe (see Dudley 2).
- English : habitational name from a lost place Ovedale or Uvedale, which gave rise to the 14th-century surname de Uvedale alias de Ovedale, connected with the manor of D’Oversdale in Litlington, Cambridgeshire; this is first recorded as ‘manor of Overdale otherwise Dowdale’ in 1408.