Teague
An Irish surname from the old personal name Taidhg, often explained as meaning “poet,” with later Anglicized spellings like Teague, Tague, and Tighe.
The #1,456 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 12,595 Americans shares it.
Etymology
Teague is generally understood as an Anglicized form of the Irish personal name Taidhg (also written Tadg or Tadhg). In older scholarship, the name was sometimes glossed as meaning “poet,” though the exact sense is not entirely certain. The surname developed as a patronymic from this given name, with spellings varying widely when Irish names were rendered into English.
History
The name is especially associated with Ireland, and the sources show a cluster of related spellings and forms such as Teague, Tague, Tigue, and Tighe. Historical reference works often treat it as a modernized or Anglicized form of the older Irish name rather than a separate native English surname. In some later usage, Teague was also treated as a conventional equivalent of Timothy in parts of Ireland, though that is a later naming habit rather than the original etymology.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
19th- and early-20th-century surname guides record Teague alongside several closely related forms, showing how one Irish name could produce many English spellings in official records.
From the historical record
“cheerful] TEAGUE, acontractedvar. of Mao Tigue, q.v. TEAKLE = Tickle, q.v. (Teut.) a nickname from theWATER- FowL [M.E. tele, O.E. *tckle] TEAL TEALE”
— Surnames of the United Kingdom: a concise etymological dictionary (2 vols in 1)