This surname is derived from a geographical locality. 'at the sea,' i.e. by the seaside, from residence thereby; compare Sands, Sandys, and Shore. The family of Say are found entered as Attsee (i.e. at the sea) and De la See in the Yorkshire Visitation, 1563; as for instance:

Sir Thomas Say.

Johanes de Say.

Say (otherwise Attsee, and De la See).

John le de Say, Somerset, 1 Edward III: Kirby's Quest.

Henery Attsee, of Heme: Visitation of Bedfordshire, 1566.

1619. Edward Say, Kent: Register of the University of Oxford.

— William Say, Kent: ibid.

1623. Edward Say and Margaret Tooting: Marriage Lic. (London).

(French) 1 belonging to Sai (Orne, Norm.).

Hugh de Say.—Hundred Rolls 2 Wise, Prudent [Bearn Dialectal saye; Latin sag-us, prophetic, soothsaying, whence Latin saga, a fortune-teller] William le Saye.—Hundred Rolls 3 a nickname from the Old French (and South.French) saye (French saie), a Tunic, (Military) Cloak [Latin *saga, sag-um, a coarse woollen mantle; also the plaid of the Celts, a military cloak; Gaulish *ság- (cp. Welsh seg-an, a cloak, and Breton séig, ‘petite robe’] (English) Dweller by the Sea [Middle English sey, see, Old English sǽ, sea (= Ger. see (pron. say] “The family of Say are found entered as Attsee and de la See in the Yorkshire Visitation, 1563’’—Bardsley, p. 669.

This entry is questionable.

(English) Dweller near the sea; one who came from Sai, in Normandy; the wise or prudent man.

“Cil de Saie,” mentioned by Wace in his account of the battle of Hastings, took his name from the vill of Saium or Say, about nine miles to the west of Exmes, the caput of Roger de Montgomeri’s Norman Viscountcy, and held under Roger in Normandy, as he afterwards did in England. He is known as Picot de Say, for Ficot, or Picot, at first a sobriquet only, is given as his recognised appellation in Domesday; though the son and grandson that inherited his barony were always styled De Say. There is still extant the charter by which he, with his wife Adeloya, and his two sons, Robert and Henry, bestowed lands in 1060 on the Abbey founded by his suzerain at Seez. He came over to England in Roger’s train; and was one of those to whom, according to Orderic, the new Earl “gave commands” in Shropshire. Twenty-nine manors were allotted to him; and Clun, as the largest of them, gave its name to his barony. In 1083, he, with the other principal men of the county, was summoned to attend at the dedication of Shrewsbury Abbey. His son Henry succeeded him, and was followed in the next generation by Helias, “whose era was nearly co-equal with Stephen’s usurpation. It was probably during this period of civil convulsion, that the Baron of Clun converted Clun into an independent jurisdiction.” - Anderson's Shropshire. He left an only daughter, Isabel, Lady of Clun, who was three times married, conveying her barony first to William Fitz Alan; then to Geoffrey de Vere; and lastly to William Boterell. On her death in 1199, it passed to the son of her first husband, William Fitz Alan II., and is now held by his descendant and representative, the Duke of Norfolk.

The junior branches of this family were unusually numerous. Those spoken of by Eyton in Shropshire alone form no inconsiderable list. Within thirty years of Domesday, Theodoric de Say, a cadet of the Barons of Clun, was enfeoffed by Roger de Lacy of Stoke, afterwards called Stokesay. One of his descendants, Hugh II., was possessed of Moreton Say as early as 1243, and about 1250 exchanged Stokesay with his suzerain, John de Verdon, for some property in Ireland, where he took up his abode. Robert de Say held Moreton Say in 1255, and, with William de Say, had summons to attend a great Council at Westminster. Roger de Say, in 1203, was a tenant of Robert de Buller’s at Hope Bowdler and Amaston. and left Lucia and Amice his co-heirs. Then we have Eustachia de Say, co-foundress of Westwood in Worcestershire, who, in the time of Henry I., married Hugh Fitz Osborn, Baron of Burford and Richard’s Castle, “Most accounts,” says Eyton, “would induce us to associate her with the Barons of Clun or the Lords of Stokesay. Either supposition is, as far as I know, without foundation. Nevertheless, Eustachia must have been a person of some importance, for she left her own surname with her descendants.” Both her sons married Cliffords, sisters of the Fair Rosamond, for whose “soul’s health” the elder was a benefactor to Godstow in 1176. Hugh de Say, the second, eventually succeeded to Richard’s Castle, and transmitted it to his son Hugh II., killed in the Welsh wars, whose daughter Margaret carried the barony to the Mortimers. His younger brother Richard was seated at Rochford. Hopesay was another of their manors.

Yet, in none of these pedigrees do we find the name of Engelram de Say, Stephen’s gallant soldier, who took prisoners two of the Empress Maud’s chief adherents, Reginald de Dunstanville and Baldwin de Redvers, and was himself taken prisoner at the battle of Lincoln, where, “when others turned their backs, he manifested his courage, fighting stoutly to the last.” - Dugdale.

The Barons Say descended from William de Say, who married Agnes, daughter of Hugh de Grentemesnil, and gave his name to Hamme-Say (now Hamsey) in the county of Sussex. “Soon after the Conquest, the De Says built a castle here upon a little peninsula formed by the sudden winding of the Ouse, of which very slight traces now remain, and continued in possession till 1383.” - Lower. In 26 Hen. III. they held fourteen knight’s fees in the county of the Honour of Warren. William’s grandson and namesake married the divorced wife of Hugh Talbot, Beatrix de Mandeville, who lived to be the sole heiress of that renowned house. She was the mother of two sons, William and Geoffrey. William died in his father’s lifetime leaving two daughters, of whom a the elder, Beatrix, was the wife of Geoffrey Fitz Piers, one of the greatest men of the kingdom, who, after a long contest, succeeded in obtaining the vast Mandeville inheritance in her right. When the last Earl of Essex died in 1190, his aunt Beatrix de Say, then a very old woman, claimed the lands and barony on behalf of her surviving son Geoffrey, and her claim was allowed; but in the end Fitz Piers carried the day, and, endowed with Mandeville’s lands, sat in Mandeville’s place as Earl of Essex (see Mandeville).

The despoiled Geoffrey found, however, an heiress of his own, the sister of Walkelin Maminot, who brought as her marriage portion a Kentish barony of twenty-seven knight’s fees; and his son Geoffrey II. obtained a large estate in Norfolk by his wife Alice de Cheney. This latter Geoffrey was one of the twenty-five barons appointed to enforce the observance of Magna Charta. The next heir, William de Say, Constable of Rochester, fought on the King’s side at Lewes, and died in 1294, as he was about to follow Edward I. to the wars of Gascony. Geoffrey III., his son, at that time a boy of fourteen, was the first Lord Say, having been summoned to Parliament in 1313. His successor, Geoffrey IV., a Banneret, and Admiral of the King’s Fleet from the river Thames westwards, did such good service in France and Flanders, that, 23 Ed. III., “in expectation of the like for the future, he was entertained to serve the King in his Wars during his whole Life, with twenty men at Arms and twenty Archers.” - Dugdale. He married Maud de Beauchamp, the daughter of Guy Earl of Warwick; and had (besides two sons who died young), William, third Lord, and three daughters; Idonea, married to Sir John Clinton; Elizabeth, married to Thomas de Aldone; and Joan, married to Sir William Fiennes, whose grandson had summons to Parliament as Lord Say in 1447 (see Fiennes).

The third Lord Say had only two children; John, fourth Lord, who died during his minority, while in ward to the King, in 1382; and Elizabeth, who became his heir, and was then sixteen years of age. “She married first Sir John de Falvesley, who fought the French in the battle of Rottingdean, and was there taken prisoner. He died without issue in 1392, and was buried at Lewes Priory. His widow re-married Sir William Heron, who also died without posterity. Both the husbands of Elizabeth were summoned to parliament as barons.” - Lower's Sussex.

The manor of Straffend or Stratfield, since Stratfieldsaye, was granted to Robert de Say by Henry III.; and passed from his descendants to the Dabridge-courts. - Woodward's Hants. Lawford-Says, in Norfolk, was held by Sir John Saye in 1478.

The first of this name mentioned by Dugdale, is Bicot de Say, who, in the time of the Conqueror, was one of the principal personages in Shropshire, under Roger de Montgomery, Earl of Shrewsbury. Though the pedigree is incomplete, he was, no doubt, the progenitor of the great family of Say, which gave birth to Geoffrey de Say, one of the twenty-five barons of Magna Charta, and many other eminent persons. The barony became abeyant in 1382, and still so remains. The name appears to have been derived from the commune of Sai, near Argentan, in Normandy. Among many De Says in the Hundred Rolls, are a few Le Says, indicating some employment, which I am unable to explain.

A baronial name. Geoddry de Saie, and the fief of Saie, Normandy, 1180-95 (Magni Rotuli Scaccarii Normanniae); Geoffry de Say, 1198 (Ib.). This was a branch of the house of Avenel. See Pigot, Avenel. The Barons de Say descended probably from Jordan de Say, t. William I., brother of Picot de S. or Avenel (MSAN, xv. 174). He founded Aunay Abbey; from whom descended Henry de S. of Warwick, 1130, William de S. of Norfolk, Hunts, and Middlesex, t. Henry II., and the Barons Say.

From the French, Saye; from the Flemish, Saey; from the Dutch, See; a personal name.

A Norman name: Sées; a local name

The Says bear a very ancient name. There flourished in Shropshire from the 11th to the 14th century a powerful and ennobled family of De Say (Eyton's "Shropshire"). Le Say and De Say were common names in Cambridge, Suffolk, Kent, and London in the 13th century (H. R.).