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Green could have various origins; locational, one who lived near the village green; or a nickname, someone who was fond of dressing in green.  The Green root is the Old English grene, which is reflected in early spellings of the name (such as William Grene in the 1230 Yorkshire rolls). 

Select Green Resources on The Internet

• The Green Family.  Green genealogy.

England and Ireland.  An early and prominent Greene family were the Greenes of Buckton in Northamptonshire.  Another Greene line traces back to Toppersfield in Essex in the 1550's.  In Ireland, the surnames Green or Greene are quite prevalent, often being an anglicization of the Gaelic names O'Huaithnin or O'Huainidh also meaning green.

America.  John Greene from Salisbury, a surgeon, came to America as early as the 1620's, first settling in Salem, Massachusetts and then moving to Providence, Rhode Island.  The Revolutionary War general Nathaniel Greene was a descendant.  Later came Green and Greene arrivals from Ireland and from elsewhere in Europe.  The surname was often adopted by German or Jewish immigrants (from the German grun) and even by incomers from Sweden.

Green and Greene are the two main spellings in the English-speaking world.  Greene is now scarce in England but relatively more common in Ireland and America (and particularly there in North Carolina).  The table below shows the approximate number of Greens and Greenes today.

Numbers (000's)	Green	Greene	Total
UK	160	6	166
Ireland	2	5	7
America	95	30	125
Elsewhere (1)	48	8	56

(1)  Canada, Australia, and New Zealand.

John and Benjamin Green, father and son, was prominent architects in NE England in the early 19th century.