The Gaelic surname means "son of ". The personal name is a Gaelicised form of the Old Norse and . The Old Norse is composed of the elements ("summer") and ("seafarer"). As such, and can be taken to mean "summer warrior", "summer seafarer". Anglicised forms of include: "MacSorley", "McSorley", "Sorley", and "Sorlie". Many settled in Ulster, hired as Gallowglass for Gaelic Kingdoms.
Forms of the surname have been borne by several families of note. For example, one such family was Clann Somhairle, descended from Somhairle mac Giolla Brighde (died 1164); another was a family closely related to the Lamonts and descended from a late thirteenth-century eponym; another was a sept of the MacDonalds and Camerons, descended from an armiger of Eóin Mac Domhnaill II, Lord of the Isles (died 1503); the name was also borne by a branch of the MacDonalds settled in Ireland.
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