Jeffrey (given name)
| Jeffrey | |
|---|---|
| Pronunciation | /ˈdʒɛfri/ |
| Gender | masculine |
| Origin | |
| Word/name | Francia, medieval France, Norman England |
| Other names | |
| Derived | Godfrey, Gottfried |
| Related names | Geoffrey, Jeff, Jeffry, Jeffy, Jefrey, Jeffery, Jefferson |
 |
Look up Jeffrey in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. |
Jeffrey /ˈdʒɛfri/ is a common English given name and, a variant form of the name Geoffrey (itself from a Middle French variant of Godfrey, Gottfried).[1] It is most commonly spelled as Jeffrey, or with one f as in Jefrey.
It has been argued (Dauzat 1980) that the common derivation of Middle French Geoffrey, Jeffrey from Godfrey is mistaken, and that the names reflect to separate first Germanic elements god vs. gaut, which became conflated in Old High German by the end of the early medieval period.[2]
The three-syllable alternative spelling Jeffery (pronounced "jef-fer-ree") is sometimes used as a variant given name. Outside of North America, Geoffrey is more common than Jeffrey. Jeffrey and its variants are found as surnames, usually as a patronymic ending in -s (e.g., Jefferies, Jaffrays). In Scotland, Jeffrey is most frequently found to be a surname.
Variations include Jeff, Jeffry, Jeffy, Jeffery, Geoff, Geoffrey, Geffrey, Jefferson, and Jeffro.
People with the name Jeffrey
Academia
- Jeffrey Garten, Juan Trippe professor of international trade, finance and business, and former dean of Yale School of Management
- Jeffrey Hackney, legal academic and former Fellow of Wadham College, Oxford
- Jeffrey A. Hoffman, professor of aeronautics and astronautics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- Jeffrey Rosen, professor of law at George Washington University Law School
- Jeffrey Sachs, professor of economics and director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University, New York
Art
- Jeffrey Steele, British abstract artist
Business
- Jeffrey Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon.com
- Jeffrey Cheah, founder of Malaysian conglomerate Sunway Group
- Jeffrey Hollender, co-founder and former CEO of Seventh Generation Inc.
- Jeffrey Katzenberg, co-founder of DreamWorks SKG and CEO of DreamWorks Animation SKG
Crime
- Jeffrey Dahmer, American serial killer
- Jeffrey Rignall, survivor of serial killer John Wayne Gacy's attack
Entertainment
- Jeffrey Ching, British contemporary classical composer
- Jeffrey Combs, American character actor best known for his horror film roles
- Jeffrey Daniel, American singer and dancer with the soul group Shalamar
- Jeffrey Dean Morgan, American actor
- Jeffrey DeMunn, American actor
- Jeffrey Donovan, American
- Jeffrey Hunter, American film and television actor
- Jeffrey Jones, American actor
- Jeffrey Katzenberg, American film producer
- Jeffrey Lewis, American musician and comic artist
- Jeffrey Nordling, American actor
- Jeffrey Reiner, film director and producer
- Jeffrey Shih, American video game player
- Jeffrey Steele, American singer and songwriter
- Jeffrey Tambor, American actor
- Jeffrey Wright (actor), American film and television actor
Literature
- Jeffrey Archer, English author and former politician
- Jeffrey Brown (comics), American comic book writer and artist
- Jeffrey Carver, American science fiction author
- Jeffrey Daniels (author), Chicago-raised African American poet, artist, and professor
- Jeffrey Eugenides, American novelist and short story writer of Greek and Irish origins
- Jeffrey Ford, American novelist and story writer
- Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson, Sanskrit specialist and author who trained as a psychoanalyst in Toronto
- Jeffrey Rowland, American webcomic artist
- Jeffrey Simpson, American-born Canadian journalist and national affairs columnist with The Globe and Mail newspaper
- Jeffrey S. Williams, American writer and Civil War historian
Military
- Jeffrey Chessani, former lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Marine Corps
- Jeffrey Feinstein, former lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Air Force
- Jeffrey J. Schloesser, former major general in the U.S. Army
- Jeffrey Williams (astronaut), former U.S. Army officer and astronaut
Sport
- Jeffrey Buttle, Canadian figure skater
- Jeffrey Hardy, best known as Jeff Hardy, American professional wrestler
- Jeffrey Lay, Canadian rower
- Jeffrey Michael Jordan, son of Michael Jordan, Former college basketball player
Fictional characters
- Jeffrey, a character in the films Beverly Hills Cop and Beverly Hills Cop II, played by Paul Reiser
- Jeffrey, a character in the 1995 film entitled Jeffrey, played by Steven Weber
- Jeffrey Goines, a character in the movie 12 Monkeys, played by Brad Pitt
- Jeffrey Todd "J.T." Hellstrom, a character on the CBS soap opera The Young and the Restless, played by Thad Luckinbill
- Jeffrey Sinclair, a character in the 1990s science fiction TV series Babylon 5, played by Michael O'Hare
- Jeff Winger, one of the main characters of Community
See also
- Geoffrey
- Jeff
- Jeffery
- Jefferson (given name)
References
- ↑ Behind the Name: Meaning, Origin and History of the Name Geoffrey
- ↑ Albert Dauzat, Noms et prénoms de France, Librairie Larousse 1980, édition revue et commentée par Marie-Thérèse Morlet. p. 287b - 288a - 296ab.