Tello
A surname with Iberian roots, often found as a shortened or patronymic form tied to the old personal name Tello.
The #3,136 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 26,819 Americans shares it.
Etymology
Tello is a medieval Iberian surname built on the personal name Tello, which appears in old Spanish and medieval records. The name itself is generally traced to an older Germanic personal-name base, though the exact prehistory is not always spelled out the same way in older scholarship. In Spanish naming practice, forms like Tello and Téllez could function as family names derived from a male ancestor called Tello.
History
The name is well attested in medieval Spain, including noble and local lineages in Castile and the Basque region. Historical records also show it as a personal name and as the basis of patronymic forms such as Téllez. In later centuries it continued as a hereditary surname, and it is now found in Spain and across the Spanish-speaking world, as well as in the United States.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Medieval documents show both Tello as a given name and Tello/Téllez as a family name, which makes it a good example of a name that could work in more than one onomastic role.
From the historical record
“Cattol or Chatel, from some foreii.ai family b.-arijig the name of Ihi Chr.n-lor De Ca.?tello. Gatton. Sec Catox. I Cattermole, from Qtiatr'-moulios i or ]'>■ Q irituor Mol:.^, the locality of whi.'h ] hivenot a=ccrtaineJ.”
— The Norman People and their existing descendants in the British dominions and the United States