Landon
A surname most often explained as coming from a place-name, probably meaning “the enclosed hill or settlement.”
The #3,844 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 33,519 Americans shares it.
Etymology
The surname is usually treated as locational, from a place called Landon or a similar name. One 19th-century explanation connects it with Old English elements meaning an enclosure or enclosed place, plus dun, “hill,” giving the sense of “the enclosed hill or town.” Other writers also linked it to French or Germanic place-name forms built on land, “land, territory,” so the exact root is not entirely certain.
History
The name appears in medieval records in forms such as de Laundon and later Landon. It was used both as a surname and as a place-related byname, and it may have arisen independently in more than one area. Because similar forms occur in England and on the Continent, later scholars sometimes treated it as a foreign or mixed place-name surname.
Origin
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Fun fact
The 19th-century surname writer Lower specifically listed Landon as a Northumberland township name, showing how often English surnames were traced back to local places.
From the historical record
“H.E., in the orthography now employed. LANDON. A township in Northum- berland. LANDOR. The family of the poet, whose ancestors wrote them.selvcs Lauude and Launder, claim to derive from the an- cient family of De la Launde. The sup- pression of the preiix and the addition of the final E, has many analogies. See…”
— Patronymica Britannica: a dictionary of the family names of the United Kingdom