Melton
Usually a locational surname from places named Melton, often meaning either “middle farm” or “mill town.”
The #688 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 6,166 Americans shares it.
Etymology
Melton is generally a habitational surname, taken from one of several English places called Melton. The name is commonly explained from Old English melde? Wait not. Properly, it is usually analyzed as Old English middel + tn, meaning “middle farm” or “middle settlement,” though some places may reflect Old English myln + tn, “mill farm” or “mill settlement.” In either case, the surname originally identified someone who came from a place so named.
History
The name appears in several English counties, which fits the surname’s spread from different local places rather than one single ancestral line. 19th-century surname writers also treated it as a standard English local name, and later references note that forms like Milton and Melton can sometimes be closely related by dialect or spelling change. Today it is established in the United States as well as in Britain.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Some sources note that Melton and Milton can sometimes be telescoped or altered forms of Middleton, showing how pronunciation and spelling could drift over time.
From the historical record
“MELSON, app. Male's Son : v. Male. MELTON (Eng.) Bel. to Melton for Milton = 1 the Mill-Stead [O.E. myln + tun] 2 the Middle Farm [O.E. middel+tun\ MENCE (Teut.-Lat.) a dim. of Lat. Clemens' V. Clement. MENDEL Iv. the Appendix of Foreign MENDELLJ Names.”
— Surnames of the United Kingdom: a concise etymological dictionary (2 vols in 1)