Russell (surname)

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Russell
Language(s)Anglo-Norman
Origin
Meaningred, or a toponymic
Region of originFrance, Ireland, Scotland, England
Other names
Variant form(s)Rosel; Rousel; Russel; Rossell; Roussel;
Frequency comparisons:[1]

Russell, also Rosel, Rousel, Roussel, Russel or Rossell. The origin of the name has historically been subject to disagreement, with two distinct origins proposed. Early genealogists traced the Russel/Russell family of Kingston Russel from Anglo-Norman landholders bearing the toponymic surname 'de Rosel' or 'du Rozel', deriving from Rosel, Calvados, Normandy (not, as has also been claimed, Le Rozel, Manche).[2] However, J. Horace Round observed that these flawed pedigrees erroneously linked toponymic-bearing men with unrelated men who instead bore the Anglo-Norman nickname rus[s]el (represented in contemporary Latin documents as Rosellus), given men with red hair.[2] This nickname was a diminutive of the Norman-French rus (Old French ros, Modern French roux[3]), meaning 'red', and was also an archaic name for the red fox,[4] which in turn borrowed from Old Norse rossel, "red-haired, from Old Norse ros "red hair color" and the suffix -el. Round concluded "there is no reason to suppose that the surname Russell was territorial at all,"[2] and surname dictionaries have preferred to derive the surname from the nickname. Dictionaries also state that the English name Rufus originally meant "red haired".[4][5]

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References[edit]

  1. ^ "Russell Surname Meaning and Geographic Distribution". forebears.co.uk. Retrieved 19 January 2014
  2. ^ a b c J. Horace Round, "The Origin of the Russells", in Studies in Peerage and Family History, Westminster: Archibald Constable and Company, 1901, pp. 250–278
  3. ^ "roux, rousse", Centre national de ressources textuelles et lexicales (in French)]
  4. ^ a b Henry Harrison, Surnames of the United Kingdom: A Concise Etymological Dictionary, London: The Moreland Press, 1918, vol. 2, p. 130
  5. ^ Patrick Hanks, ed. Dictionary of American Family Names, Oxford University Press, 2003, ISBN 0-19-508137-4, vol. 3, p. 240.
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