McSorley — The Summer Seafarer

McSorley anglicises Mac Somhairle, ‘son of Somhairle’ — a Gaelic form of the Old Norse Sumarliðr, from sumar, ‘summer’, and a word for ‘seafarer’: in plain terms, a Viking. The name belonged to a branch of the MacDonnells of the Scottish isles, and most accounts have it crossing to Ulster with the galloglass, the Scottish soldiers hired by Gaelic lords, to settle chiefly in Tyrone and Antrim.

A name that came to Ireland by sea twice — once as a Norse word, once with Scottish soldiers — and stayed both times.

Irish form: Mac Somhairle