Cullen
An Irish and Scottish surname that can mean “descendant of Cuileann/Cuillen” and is also linked to a Scottish place-name.
The #1,796 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 15,437 Americans shares it.
Etymology
The surname is most often explained from Irish Gaelic forms such as O'Coileáin or Mac Cuilinn/Cuillen, with the underlying personal-name element sometimes glossed as “whelp,” “young warrior,” or “holly,” depending on the tradition followed. In Scottish usage it is also associated with the place-name Cullen in Banffshire, which older writers connected either with holly trees or with a name referring to a neck or bend by a lake. The evidence in 19th-century sources is mixed, so the name may be independently Irish and Scottish in origin rather than from one single source.
History
Irish forms of the surname were later anglicized in several ways, including Collins, Quillen, and Cullen, and the name is linked in older tradition to an early medieval Irish chief named Cuileán. In Scotland, Cullen can also be a local surname from the town of Cullen in Banffshire. Because both Irish and Scottish lines converged on the same spelling, the modern surname has more than one historical source.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Older surname dictionaries explicitly note that Cullen could be either Irish or a local Scottish name, which makes it a good example of a single spelling with two different histories.
From the historical record
“CULL. Silly, simple. North. Ilalliw. CULLEN. 1. Irish. See Cuillean. 2. An old spelling of Cologne. CULLIFORD. A hundred in co. Dorset. CULLING. See Cullen. CULLOCH. IMacculloch, sans Mac. CULPECK. Probably Kilpeck, co. Here- ford.”
— Patronymica Britannica: a dictionary of the family names of the United Kingdom