Ready
An English nickname surname for someone who was quick, willing, or prepared, with some Irish families also bearing it as an anglicized form of O'Riada.
The #6,896 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 63,332 Americans shares it.
Etymology
In English, Ready comes from the Middle English word ready, meaning quick, willing, or prepared, used as a nickname for a person with that quality. Some English surname dictionaries also connect it to a diminutive form built from Read, though the simplest explanation is the nickname sense. In Irish usage, Ready can also represent an anglicized form of O'Riada, from the personal name Riad/Riada.
History
The name appears in English records as a descriptive byname and was later fixed as a hereditary surname. Irish bearers may derive from the Gaelic O'Riada line, so the same modern spelling can have different origins in different families. Because of that, ancestry rather than spelling alone is important in tracing the name.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
A 19th-century source glossed Ready simply as “one of a quick or willing disposition.”
From the historical record
“wine, friend] READY (Eng.) = Read • (q.v.) +the dim. suff. -y. (Ir.) for the Irish O'Riada = Descen- dant OF RiAD [Ir. d or ua, grandson, descendant; and cp. Ir. riadh-dch, brownish, brindled] (Ir.-Teut.) a double dim. of Redmond, q.v. REAKES, a var. of Raikes, Rakes, q.v.”
— Surnames of the United Kingdom: a concise etymological dictionary (2 vols in 1)