Origin of the Name Dunphy
The
Dunphy family history was found in the allfamilycrests.com archives.
Over the centuries Surnames developed a wide number of variants. Different spellings of the same name can be traced back to an original root. Additionally when a bearer of a name emigrated it was not uncommon that their original name would be incorrectly transcribed in the record books at their new location. Surnames were also often altered over the years based on how they sounded phonetically and depending on the prevailing political conditions it may have been advantageous to change a name from one language to another.
Variants of the name Dunphy
include Dunfy, MacDunphy, Dumphy and Dunphie. This Irish surname is one of the most important as well as most numerous names in Ireland , from the Irish O'Donnchaidh sept, meaning 'descendant of Donogh'. This Gaelic sept name was also widely anglicized as O'Donoghue, Donohue and Donahue. When Gaelic names were anglicized during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries they were often changed to Anglo equivalents that sounded most like their original Gaelic name. MacDunphy is derived from the MacDonnchaidh sept, also anglicized as McDonagh.
A sept or clan is a collective term describing a group of persons whose immediate ancestors bore a common surname and inhabited the same territory. Irish septs and clans that are related often belong to even larger groups, sometimes called tribes.
Over the centuries names were changed according to how they sounded and were pronounced with the same name often being both spelled and pronounced differently in neighbouring towns and cities. The Dunphys are most associated with the ancient Ossory territory, comprising mostly of County Kilkenny.
The Dunphy coat of arms came into existence centuries ago. The process of creating coats of arms (also often called family crests) began in the eleventh century although a form of Proto-Heraldry may have existed in some countries prior to this. The new art of Heraldry made it possible for families and even individual family members to have their very own coat of arms, including all Dunphy descendants.