Skip to main content

Updated January 25, 2024

Table of contents

Family name origins & meanings

  • English and Scottish : topographic name for someone who lived in the woods (see Wood).
  • Irish : English name adopted as a translation of Ó Cuill ‘descendant of Coll’ (see Quill), or in Ulster of Mac Con Coille ‘son of Cú Choille’, a personal name meaning ‘hound of the wood’, which has also been mistranslated Cox, as if formed with coileach ‘cock’, ‘rooster’.

Famous people with this last name

Subscribe to Family Education

Your partner in parenting from baby name inspiration to college planning.

Subscribe