This surname is derived from a geographical locality. 'at the place,' i.e. the stead, the farm, &c, any building or locality styled 'the Place'. 'A place, a room, a stead ... a faire large court' - Cotgrave. Hence place in the titles of mansions and villas. The surname arose from residence at such a spot.

William de la Place, Lincolnshire, 1273. Hundred Rolls.

John atte Place, Somerset, 1 Edward III: Kirby's Quest.

1592. Richard Preiste and Agnes Playce, widow: Marriage Lic. (London).

1604-5. John Place, Yorkshire: Register of the University of Oxford.

1627-8. Married — John Place and Elizabeth Richardson: St. Dionis Backchurch.

(Anglo-French-Latin-Greek) Dweller at a Place, i.e. a Hall or Country Mansion [French place, a place, town, square; Latin platea, Greek πλατεΐα (fem. of πλατύς, wide), a broad street] John atte Place.—Subsidy Roll (Soms.), A.D. 1327.

In the 17th century the term ‘place- house’ was used to denote a country- seat— ‘I hate London; our place-house in the country is worth a thousand of ’t.’— Wycherley, The Country Wife.

(English, French) Dweller at a country mansion, near a market square or on a plot of land; one who came from Place (town, or fortress), in France; one who came from Plash or Plaish (marshy pool), the names of places in Somerset and Shropshire.

“The noble family of De Playz were,” says Blomfield, in his History of Norfolk, “soon after the Conquest, enfeoffed of several lordships by the Earl Warren.” Ralph de Playz witnesses a charter of William, second Earl 1091-97, granting the church of Coningsburgh, in South Yorkshire, to the monastery that his father had founded at Lewes. “Sir Hugh was Lord in the time of King Stephen,” and was succeeded by a second Ralph. “The family of De Playz had a considerable estate in Otringhythe; and in the reign of King Henry II. there was a church concerning the patronage of which there was a great controversy between Sir Ralph de Playz and others, which was adjusted by the Bishop of Norwich, when it was allowed to be the right of the said Ralph, and his heirs for ever, to present to the same.” - Ibid. Among the adherents of the rebellious barons under King John we find another Sir Hugh, who held seven knight’s fees at Ifford and Werpesburn in Sussex, and was twice married. From his first wife, Beatrix de Say, widow of Hugh de Nevill, he was divorced; but the second, Philippa, one of the co-heiresses of Richard de Montfichet, brought him a great estate in Essex, where the manor of Playz, in Beacontree Hundred, and the hamlet of Plaistow, near Stratford, are named from him. His great-grandson Giles was summoned to a great council held by Edward I. in 1293, followed him to Gascony in the ensuing year, and was a baron by writ in 1297. Sir Richard, the grandson of Giles, was, in 1334, found heir to Stansted Montfichet on the death of John de Lancaster; and the next heir, Sir John, called the fourth baron (though neither he not his predecessor were ever summoned to parliament) was the father of Margery, the heiress of the house, who carried the barony to the Howards. Morant tells that Sir Robert Howard “purchased her in a manner from her father Sir John Playz”for the sum of fifty marks of silver. Her granddaughter Elizabeth transferred it to the De Veres, and it fell into abeyance between the three sisters and co-heirs of the fourteenth Earl of Oxford.

According to an old deed (quoted by Blomfield) the last Sir John de Playz had a brother named Richard, living at Fettwell in Norfolk, but of him or his posterity we hear nothing more. A family of this name was seated at Halnaby in North Yorkshire, and afterwards (through a Surtees heiress) at Dinsdale in the county of Durham, continuing till the early part of the last century. William de Playz is mentioned in Yorkshire as early as 1189-90 (Rot. Pip.).

1. Like the French place, a square or open space in a town. 2. More probably from a ' place,' or mansion. What is called in other shires a hall, or a court, is frequently known in the south-eastern counties as a ' place,' e.g.: Brasted Place, co. Kent, Wakehurst Place, co. Sussex, Crowhurst Place, co. Surrey.

Armorially identified with Plaiz or De Plessetis, a Norman baronial family. Radulphus, Gardinus, Ascius de Plaissecio, Plaisuz, Pleiz, or Plessys, Normandy 1180-95 (Magni Rotuli Scaccarii Normanniae). Giles de Playz was summoned by writ as a baron 1293.

From the Danish, Plees; from the German, Pless; from the Flemish, Pleis; from the Dutch, Ples; from the French, Place; a personal name.

A Norman name: Plessis; a local name

Place: from either Plaçy in Calvados or Plaçe in Mayenne.