Curtis or Curtiss is a common English given name and surname of Anglo-Norman origin from the Old French curteis which ultimately derived from the Spanish Cortés and the Portuguese and Galician Cardoso. The name means "polite, courteous, or well-bred". It is a compound of curt- ″court″ and -eis ″-ish″. The spelling u to render [u] in Old French was mainly Anglo-Norman and Norman, when the spelling o [u] was the usual Parisian French one, Modern French ou [u]. -eis is the Old French suffix for -ois, Western French keeps -eis, simplified -is in English. The word court shares the same etymology but retains a Modern French spelling, after the orthography had changed.
