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The name Moraes is of Portuguese origin.
The English meaning of Moraes is Moraes, Portugal
The surname Moraes is a toponymic name, which means that it is derived from a geographical location. Toponymic names can be based on anything from the name of a town or village to the name of a forest or pasture. This is the largest category of family names, probably due to the geographical migrations to which the Jews from Spain and Portugal were subject after the Inquisition and the love they had for the country in which they had lived for many centuries.
There are many indicators that the name Moraes may be of Jewish origin, emanating from the Jewish communities of Spain and Portugal.
When the Romans conquered the Jewish nation in 70 CE, much of the Jewish population was sent into exile throughout the Roman Empire. Many were sent to the Iberian Peninsula. The approximately 750,000 Jews living in Spain in the year 1492 were banished from the country by royal decree of Ferdinand and Isabella. The Jews of Portugal, were banished several years later. Reprieve from the banishment decrees was promised to those Jews who converted to Catholicism. Though some converted by choice, most of these New-Christian converts were called CONVERSOS or MARRANOS (a derogatory term for converts meaning pigs in Spanish), ANUSIM (meaning "coerced ones" in Hebrew) and CRYPTO-JEWS, as they secretly continued to practice the tenets of the Jewish faith.
Our research has found that the family name Moraes is cited with respect to Jews & Crypto-Jews in at least 9 bibliographical, documentary, or electronic references