Pick
An old surname that likely began as a nickname for someone associated with a pike, spear, or pick-like tool.
The #9,451 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 89,699 Americans shares it.
Etymology
The surname is generally explained from French pic/pique, meaning a pick, pike, or spear, and may also connect with the older English word pick for a pointed tool or weapon. Some 19th-century writers also linked it with the woodpecker image behind Latin picus, but the weapon/tool explanation is the more direct one. In practice, it may have started as a nickname for a person who carried or made such an implement, or who was thought of as sharp or pointed in some way.
History
The name appears in medieval English records in forms such as Pic and Picque, and it was treated by later surname scholars as related to other names built on the same root, such as Picard. Like many short surnames, it could also overlap with local or descriptive uses, so not every family may share the same origin. The name has remained uncommon in England and the United States, though it is straightforward in form and easy to preserve across generations.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Some older surname writers grouped Pick with names for the pike weapon and even noted a possible connection with the woodpecker name Picus.
From the historical record
“See the note under Pitcher. PICK (Fr.) the French Pic, Pkq, Picque ^ , I a nickname from the Pike (weapon) [Fr. pique, a pike, spear ; the same word as pic, a .pick, and Ital. piccd, a pike; also O.E. pic, a pike : cp. Lat. pic-us a wood- pecker] 2 a nickname from the Wooppecker \¥x. pic, l^si. pic^us] Picus (mod.…”
— Surnames of the United Kingdom: a concise etymological dictionary (2 vols in 1)