Anglo-Norman patronymic meaning 'son of Gerald,' from Germanic 'ger' (spear) and 'wald' (rule).
Fitzgerald is a Norman surname pressed into service as a given name, and it carries the entire Anglo-Norman conquest of Ireland in its syllables. The *fitz* prefix derives from the Norman French *fils* and ultimately Latin *filius* (son), while *Gerald* comes from the Germanic elements *ger* (spear) and *wald* (rule) — making Fitzgerald literally "son of the spear-ruler." The Fitzgeralds — descended from the Norman knight Maurice FitzGerald who arrived in Ireland with Strongbow in 1169 — became one of the most powerful dynasties in Irish history, the Earls of Kildare and Desmond, who at their height in the late fifteenth century effectively governed Ireland independently of the English crown.
As a given name, Fitzgerald reached its greatest cultural altitude through F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940), born Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald — himself named for the author of the Star-Spangled Banner, a distant relative — whose novels *The Great Gatsby*, *Tender Is the Night*, and *This Side of Paradise* made him the defining chronicler of the American Jazz Age. His surname became a byword for brilliant, doomed romanticism.
The name gained further presidential resonance through the Kennedy family: John Fitzgerald Kennedy carried the name as a middle name honoring his maternal grandfather John F. "Honey Fitz" Fitzgerald, Boston's legendary Irish-American mayor. Used as a given name, Fitzgerald projects a certain grandeur — it is long, Latinate in rhythm, and carries both Irish-American ethnic pride and literary prestige.
It has never been common as a first name, which ensures it retains distinction. Parents drawn to it today are usually drawn to a specific cultural inheritance: the Irish-American story of ambition and ascent, the Gatsbyesque pursuit of an impossible dream, or the gravity of a name that sounds, from the first syllable, like someone worth knowing.