Lindo
A surname that can point to a Portuguese naturalized name, or in some cases to a Spanish word meaning “handsome” or “neat.”
The #9,066 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 85,644 Americans shares it.
Etymology
The surname has more than one plausible origin. One 19th-century source says Lindo was naturalized from Portugal and equates it with Lind, while another glosses the Spanish word lindo as “neat, spruce, fine.” Separately, English records show Lindo as a surname in northern England, where it may reflect a local or variant form rather than the Romance-language adjective. Because the historical evidence points in different directions, the safest view is that Lindo is a surname with multiple possible roots.
History
In British and colonial records, Lindo appears as a family name in several spellings, including Lindoe and Lindowe. The name is also found in Spanish-speaking contexts, where it would have been understood as the adjective lindo. In English usage, it may also overlap with older northern forms related to Lind or Lindow, so the surname’s history is not single-threaded.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
The Spanish common word lindo is still used today to mean “pretty,” “nice,” or “lovely,” which helped make the surname feel positive and descriptive.
From the historical record
“shire are so called. LINDO. Naturalized from Portugal. The same as Liud. LINDSAY. This distinguished family, who boasted of twenty Earls of Crawford, extending from the year 1398 to 1808, and whose deeds have been recorded by a noble member of the house, in his " Lives of the Lindsays," were in all probability of…”
— Patronymica Britannica: a dictionary of the family names of the United Kingdom