On Sun, 14 Feb 2016 21:39:09 -0000, "Mr Macaw" wrote:

On Sun, 14 Feb 2016 02:08:20 -0000, Ed Pawlowski wrote:

On 2/13/2016 8:25 PM, rbowman wrote:
On 02/13/2016 03:04 PM, Mr Macaw wrote:
You've got it backwards anyway: "Clare is a given name, the Medieval
English form of Clara.[1] The related name Clair was traditionally
considered male, especially when spelled without an 'e',[2] but Clare
and Claire are usually female."

As someone from a country where Evelyn Waugh married Evelyn Gardner and
it wasn't a same sex marriage, there might be some confusion with
British names

Clare can be a last name too.

I've heard that in French, but not in any normal country.

So only Scotland is a normal country? At any rate, the surname Clare
is NOT particularly French, although it's origins may trace back to
the Normans as indicated below (from wikipedia)

Clare is a surname of English origin. The name is also prevalent among
families of Irish origin, and there is a Clare County, Clare Island
and River Clare in Ireland which attests to a long historical
relationship with those places. The name was likely derived from the
titular de Clare first held by Richard fitz Gilbert, a Welsh lord from
a Norman family.
Or from surnamedb.com:

Last name: Clare


This most interesting and ancient surname, with its long association
with the British nobility, has three possible origins. It may be Olde
English and derive from the pre 8th century word 'cleare' which
translates as 'bright or clear' and as such was applied to various
rivers and a Manor in the county of Suffolk. A second possibility is
French, from a place called Clere in Normandy and first recorded in
the 1086 Domesday Book of England, whilst the third is baptismal from
the French 'Claire' or the Latin 'Clara' which themselves translate as
'bright of fair'. The original spelling forms were Clere, Clarae,
Clara, Clare, and Clair(e), however there is some confusion in that in
the early days the surnames were almost always proceeded by the French
preposition 'de', although by the 16th century its use had almost died
out. Irish nameholders also trace their heritage from the same
sources, Richard de Clare, Earl of Pembroke, and better known as
'Strongbow' was the great leader of the Anglo-Norman Invasion of
Ireland in 1170. The primary source of the surname is probably the
Clare family of Clare in Suffolk, who received the Dukedom of Clarence
in 1362. Early examples of the surname include Bogo de Clare of Oxford
in the 1273 Kings Rolls, Goditha Clare of Kent in 1317, and Thomas
Clair of St Giles Cripplegate, London on January 19th 1664. The
'first' Clare/Clair(e) into the New American Colonies of King James 1
was probably Mr Clare, Master of the Ship 'Gods Gift' of London.
Unfortunately he was dead when he 'arrived' at Elizabeth City on or
about February 16th 1623. The first recorded spelling of the family
name is shown to be that of Richard de Clare, which was dated 1086,
The Domesday Book for County Suffolk, England, during the reign of
King William 1, 1066 - 1087. Surnames became necessary when
governments introduced personal taxation. In England this was known as
Poll Tax. Throughout the centuries, surnames in every country have
continued to "develop" often leading to astonishing variants of the
original spelling.