Family name origins & meanings
- German and Jewish (Ashkenazic) : nickname for a person with a cheerful disposition, from Middle High German vrīlīch ‘open’, Yiddish freylekh ‘happy’, ‘cheerful’. In modern German, the word freilich has become specialized as an adverb meaning ‘certainly’, but the surname is most probably from the older adjectival sense. As a Jewish surname it can also be ornamental. In America there has been some confusion with Froehlich.