Brent

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Brent is an English place name and surname. The place name can be from Celtic words meaning "holy one" (if it refers to the River Brent), or "high place" (if it refers to the villages in Somerset and Devon, England) (Mills 1991). The surname often indicates that one's ancestors lived in a place called Brent, but it can also come from the Middle English word brent meaning burned, indicating that one's ancestor either lived near a burned-over area, or was a criminal who had been branded on the cheek (Hanks and Hodges 1988).

Brent has also become a regularly used given name, being among the thousand most common names for boys born in the United States since 1933. [1] When used as a given name today, Brent is sometimes a short form of Brenton, but this was probably not the original inspiration for Brent's use as a given name, since Brenton's own regular use as a first name came many years after Brent was established in that role (Evans 2006).

Contents 1 Place names 2 Surname 3 Given names 4 Other terms 5 References

[edit] Place names

• the London Borough of Brent
• the River Brent which runs through the Boroughs of Barnet, Brent, Ealing and Hounslow.
• the Brent oilfield in the North Sea (named after the goose) or its products Brent Crude or Brent Blend
• Brent, Ontario, a small locality in the Algonquin Provincial Park in Ontario, Canada
• the Brent meteor crater in Canada which was named after the village of Brent, Ontario
• Brent International School, an International School in the Philippines

[edit] Surname

• Bix Brent
• Dannielle Brent
• David Brent, fictional office middle-manager of BBC television comedy The Office, played by co-writer and director Ricky Gervais
• Ebony-Jewel Rainford-Brent
• Elinor Brent-Dyer
• Evelyn Brent
• Gary Brent
• George Brent
• Leslie Brent
• Richard Brent
• Richard Brent (scientist)
• Richard Brent (Virginia)
• Robert Brent

[edit] Given names

• Brent W. Jett, Jr., US astronaut
• Brent Musburger, US journalist and sports commentator for ABC.
• Brent Sadler, US journalist and CNN reporter, ex-colleague of war-correspondent Peter Arnett
• Brent Scowcroft, security advisor of the US-presidents Reagan and Bush Senior 1989-1993
• Brent Spiner, US actor (for example: "Data" in "Star Trek" or "Dr. Okun" in "Independence Day"
• Brent Symonette, Bahamian politician
• Brent Mydland, Grateful Dead keyboardist from 1979-1990

[edit] Other terms

• the Brent Goose Branta bernicla
• Brent's method in Mathematics

[edit] References

Evans, C. K. (2006). The great big book of baby names. Lincolnwood, Illinois: Publications International Limited. ISBN 1-4127-1300-5.

Hanks, P. & Hodges, F. (1988). A dictionary of surnames. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-211592-8.

Mills, A. D. (1991). A dictionary of English place-names. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-869156-4.