Family name origins & meanings
- English : from Middle English pile ‘stake’, ‘post’ (via Old English from Latin pilum ‘spike’, ‘javelin’), hence a topographic name for someone who lived near a stake or post serving as a landmark or a metonymic occupational name for a stake maker or a nickname for a tall strong man.
- Dutch : metonymic occupational name for a marksman or an arrowsmith, from pijl ‘arrow’.