Winkle
A surname usually tied to someone who lived by a corner, nook, or secluded bend in the landscape.
The #8,131 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 75,729 Americans shares it.
Etymology
The name is commonly explained from Old English wincel, meaning a corner, nook, or secluded recess. In surname use, it likely began as a descriptive place-name byname for someone who lived near such a spot, or as a local surname from places called Wincle/Winkle. Some 19th-century writers also linked it specifically to the Cheshire place-name Wincle, but the deeper element was still taken to be the same Old English word.
History
The surname is recorded in a few spellings such as Winckle and Winkles, and was treated by older surname scholars as both a local name and a topographic nickname. It appears in English records and later spread to North America, where it remains uncommon. The same word also shows up in place-names like Wincle in Cheshire, which likely helped stabilize the surname form.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Older surname writers even used Winkle as an example of a name that may come from an actual English place-name as well as from a landscape feature.
From the historical record
“with Wingfielcl, q.v. WINKLE (Eng.) Dweller at the Corner or Nook [O.E. wincel] More specifically Wincle, Chesh. WINKLEY (Eng.) Bel. to i Winkleigh (Devon), 13th cent. Wynklegh [A.-Sax. forms are desirable, but the name prob. represents O.E. wincel, a corner -|- Udh, a lea]”
— Surnames of the United Kingdom: a concise etymological dictionary (2 vols in 1)