nameLab: find a name, make a name, change a name

Last name origins & meanings:

1. English: from a short form of the personal names Giles, Julian, or William. In theory the name would have a soft initial when derived from the first two of these, and a hard one when from William or from the other possibilities discussed in 2–4 below. However, there has been much confusion over the centuries.
2. Northern English: topographic name for someone who lived by a ravine or deep glen, Middle English gil(l), Old Norse gil ‘ravine’.
3. Scottish and Irish: reduced Anglicized form of Gaelic Mac Gille (Scottish), Mac Giolla (Irish), patronymics from an occupational name for a servant or a short form of the various personal names formed by attaching this element to the name of a saint. See McGill. The Old Norse personal name Gilli is probably of this origin, and may lie behind some examples of the name in northern England.
4. Scottish and Irish: reduced Anglicized form of Gaelic Mac An Ghoill (see Gall 1).
5. Norwegian: habitational name from any of three farmsteads in western Norway named Gil, from Old Norse gil ‘ravine’.
6. Dutch: cognate of Giles.
7. Jewish (Israeli): ornamental name from Hebrew gil ‘joy’.
8. German: from a vernacular short form of the medieval personal name Aegidius (see Gilger).
9. Indian (Panjab): Sikh name, probably from Panjabi gil ‘moisture’, also meaning ‘prosperity’. There is a Jat tribe that bears this name; the Ramgarhia Sikhs also have a clan called Gill.

This name appears in the following lists: Country Stars