FAIRFAX. A-Sax. fcegr and feax, fair-haired. The same as the Latin Flavus, the Fr. Blond, &c. " Fax and vex are the same, signifying hair. Hence jMatthew of Westminster calleth a comet, which is Stella crinita, vexed .star A-Sax.majcf? steorra ; aud this family had their name from beautiful bushy hair. I confess I find in Florilegus, writing of the Holy War, " Primimrbellum Cliristianoriun fuit apud pontem Pliarfax fluminis ; but cannot concur with them who hence derive the name of this family." Fuller, (Worthies of England, iii, -iU,) who adds, that in his time (two hundred years ago) twenty generations of Fairfaxes had resided on one spot, at Walton, co. York — a rare instance of long territorial possession by one name and family. The existing representative of this ancient race is Lord Fairfax, an American by birth and parentage, who, with the same republican principles which actuated his great ancestor, prefers a quiet life at Woodburue in Maryland, to a seat in the House of Peers.

Lower, Mark A (1860) Patronymica Britannica: a dictionary of the family names of the United Kingdom. London: J.R. Smith. Public Domain.