Explore the Family Name Bayard

The meaning of Bayard

1. French: from Old French baiart ‘bay-colored’, a nickname for someone with reddish-brown hair. Compare 2 below. 2. English (of Norman origin): from Bayard, the name of the bright bay magic horse given by Charlemagne to Renaud in a 12th-century chanson de geste, derived from Old French baiart (as in 1 above). It was subsequently used as a mock-heroic name for any horse, particularly for a blindly reckless or foolish one. Applied as a nickname it probably denoted someone with a proud, haughty, or reckless disposition, rather than someone with reddish brown hair. 3. English (of Norman origin): perhaps occasionally from Old French bayard, baiart ‘hand barrow used for heavy loads’, used possibly to denote a mason’s laborer. History: A Huguenot family of this name migrated from France to Antwerp in the 16th century. In 1647 Anna Bayard, widow of Samuel Bayard, and her three young children accompanied her brother Peter Stuyvesant to New Amsterdam in New Netherland (now New York City, NY) aboard the Princess. Her sons Petrus and Nicolas Bayard, both born in Alphen, the Netherlands, had many prominent descendants in North America. Peter Stuyvesant’s wife Judith was a Bayard. The French surname Bayard is listed in the (US) National Huguenot Society’s register of qualified Huguenot ancestors and also in the similar register of the Huguenot Society of America. Some characteristic forenames: French Pierre, Vilaire, Alcee, Antoine, Franck, Ghislaine, Marcel.

Dictionary of American Family Names, 2nd edition, © Oxford University Press, 2022.