This surname is derived from a geographical locality. 'of Tweeddale.' Probably a corruption of Tweedale (v. Twaddle).

1624. Married — William Lake and Elizabeth Twedy: St. Peter, Cornhill.

1745. — Francisco Sisco and Mary Tweedy: St. George's Chapel, Mayfair.

The Tweedies were an old Peeblesshire family, and, according to a favorite mythic story, the first of the name was the child of a species of water spirit or genius of the Tweed, hence their name (Chambers, Picture of Scotland, I, p. 190). Unfortunately for the truth of this story the name is derived from the lands of Tweedie in the parish of Stonehouse, Lanarkshire. Finlay de Twydyn of Lanarkshire rendered homage in 1296 (Bain, II, p. 202), and Watere de Twydi was juror on an inquest at Lanark, 1303 (Bain, II, p. 345). Roger, son of Finlay of Twydyn, had a charter of the house and lands of Diumelzier, c. 1320 (Hay, 8). After possessing, the lands and barony for fully three hundred years the family lost them in the reign of Charles I. William Tuedin received a gift from Robert I of some tenements in Stirling which had been forfeited by Gilbert Lindsay (RMS., I, App. II, 674). In 1362 there is mention of payment of nine merks yearly due from the lands of Hopkelloche by James of Tuedi and his heirs (RMS., I, 130). William de Twidy, a charter witness, 1370 (RHM., II. p. 89). James of Twedy, deputy for Joneta de Graham, lady of Walchtone, 1389 (ibid., II, 189), is doubtless the James of Twedy who witnessed a charter at Dalkeith in 1390 (Edmonstone, p. 78). Walter of Twedy granted an annual rent from the lands of Drumelzier, 1426 (Hay, 10), Thomas Twedye held a tenement in Irvine, 1542 (Irvine, I, p. 191). Elizabeth Twedy held a tenement in Glasgow, 1550 (Protocols, I), and Magister Thomas Tueadie was commissary of Aberdeen, 1583 (Aboyne, p. 159). The Tweedies had the reputation of being a savage race and at the close of 1592 they reverted to their true character. "We learn from an entry in the Record that they had perpetrated quite as deliberate a murder as that committed by them less than two years previously near the castle of Neidpath. Their victim. . was one of the Geddesses, with whom they were at feud, and the scene of the atrocity was at a blacksmith's door in the Cowgate of Edinburgh. . . The complaint states that 'it is not unknawne how mony slauchters have been committit upon them by James Twedy of Drummelzeair and his friends' and now he has committed the barbarous murder of the said James Geddes within the burgh of Edinburgh. having by means of spies, watched the said Laird of Glenhegdon, near his lodgings, found he was in the Cowgait at David Lindsay's buith shoeing his horse, on the 29th of December" (Chambers, History of Peeblesshire, p. 119). Pennecuik in 1715 described the Tweedies of Drummelzier as "a powerful and domineering family now quite extinct" (Description of Tweeddale, p. 253—254). Tuedy 1560, Tuedye 1627, Tueithe and Tweeddy 1684, Tueydie 1631, Twedie 1608, Tweedy 1455, Tweiddy 1682; Tuedie, Tuedv, Tueedie, Twyddie.

Tweedie is a sept of the Scottish clan Fraser. It may be a coincidence that one of the earliest Tweedys to be on record in Ireland, Patrick Tweedy, was a lieutenant in the regiment of the army stationed at Carrickfergus, under the command of Capt. Alexander Frazer. That was in 1678. There was a Tweddy in Ulster some fifty years earlier, when, in 1629, Walter Tweddy and a number of other men, mostly Gaelic Irish, obtained leases of “planted” lands in Co. Cavan. The name has never been numerous in Ireland and, except in Dublin, is little known outside Ulster, where it has been mainly found in counties Cavan and Armagh. There is a Ballytweedy in Co. Antrim but this is one of many misleading placenames-the tweedy is not taken from the surname Tweedy.

(17th cent. Twedy) shortened forms of Tweed(d)ale, q.v.

This Scottish name, that of a branch of the clan Frazer, is in Ulster since the early seventeenth century. SIF 150

(Scottish) One who came from the lands of Tweedie (hemming in), in the parish of Stonehouse, Lanarkshire.

The name of Tweedy has its present English home in the North and East Ridings. It is also a Scottish name, though not very common there. There are now a few of the name at Bromley, Kent, perhaps descendants of a gentle family of Twedye, or Twedy, that resided at Boreham, Essex, in the reign of Elizabeth, having come from Scotland two generations before (Wright's "Essex").