Macdonald

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For other uses, see Macdonald (disambiguation).
"McDonald" redirects here. For the global fast food chain, see McDonald's.

Contents

Macdonald
Family Name
Meaning Son of world ruler
Region of origin Scottish
Language of origin Gaelic
Related names MacDonald, McDonald,Mac Dhomhnuill, Domhnall
Popularity Behind the Name 
Wikipedia articles All pages beginning with Macdonald

MacDonald, Macdonald, and McDonald are anglicized forms of the Scottish/Irish Gaelic name "Mac Dhomhnuill", a patronymic from the personal name "Domhnall". Domhnall means world ruler and Mac means son of.

In the context of Scottish Clans, the various forms of the name refer to one of the largest clans, Clan Donald.

[edit] Frequency and distribution

In Scottish surname data, no distinction is made between, for instance, "Macdonald" and "MacDonald".[1] According to this data, the following frequency information can be collated:

Year(s) Macdonald Rank  %freq[2] McDonald Rank  %freq
1855–1858[3] 2 1.23 <50 <0.30
1901[4] 38 (2)[4] 0.37 9 0.83
1935[3] 2 1.03 <50 <0.28
1958[3] 3 0.98 <50 <0.26
1976[5] 10 0.59 23 0.40
1990[5] 10 0.55 32 0.35
1999–2001[1][5] 9 0.55 24 0.37
Table References[3][5][4][2]

Frequency data from England of 1891 shows a concentration of families bearing the "Macdonald" surname in Lancashire and Yorkshire with a lower frequency in the northernmost counties, but overall widespread distribution throughout the country.[6] "McDonald" shares the same pattern of distribution.[7] Looking at contemporaneous data from the United States, coast-to-coast distribution of both "Macdonald" and "McDonald" appears in 1880.[8][9] Looking back to 1840 in the United States, the prevalence of "McDonald" is far greater than that of "Macdonald", with concentration in the Ohio-Pennsylvania-New York corridor.[10][11]

[edit] Notable people: MacDonald surname

Born after 1400
  • John of Islay, Earl of Ross or "John MacDonald" (1434–1503), Scottish ruler, Fourth Lord of the Isles, Chief of the Highland Clan Donald
Born after 1700
Born after 1800
  • George MacDonald (1824–1905), Scottish-English author, poet, and Christian minister
  • John L. MacDonald (1838–1903), Scottish-American national politician
  • Sir Claude Maxwell MacDonald (1852–1915), British soldier and diplomat
  • Sir Hector MacDonald (1853–1903), Scottish Major-General of the British Army under Lord Kitchener
  • Ramsay MacDonald (1866–1937), Scottish politician, twice Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (illegitimate son of "Macdonald" father and "Ramsay" mother, registered at birth as "James McDonald Ramsay")
  • Ranald MacDonald (1834–1894), Scottish-Chinook educator. First man to teach the English language in Japan
  • William Josiah MacDonald (1873–1946), American lawyer and national politician
Born after 1900
Born after 1950

[edit] Notable people: Macdonald surname

Born after 1800
Born after 1900
Born after 1950

[edit] Notable people: McDonald surname

Born after 1800
Born after 1900
Born after 1950

[edit] Pseudonyms

  • Ian MacDonald (born "MacCormick" 1948–2003), British music critic and author

[edit] Relationships

  • Brothers: J.S. Macdonald (b.1812) ↔ D.A. Macdonald (b.1817)
  • Brothers: C. McDonald (b.1955) ↔ D. McDonald (b.1960)
  • Father-son: A. McDonald (b.1937) → D. Tennant (McDonald) (b.1971)
  • Father-Daughter-in-Law: J.A. Macdonald (b.1874) → M.M. Macdonald (b.1910)

[edit] Notable fictional characters

[edit] See also

Ambiguous human name pages

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b Surnames in Scotland over the last 140 years. Occasional papers. General Register Office for Scotland. Retrieved on 2008-02-10. “In this new survey of surnames, as in all previous surveys, we have not distinguished between the varying use of capital letters within surnames e.g. MacDonald/Macdonald. However, as in the previous two surveys, each spelling is noted separately in the tables e.g. McDonald/MacDonald.”
  2. ^ a b %freq = percentage of the sample population sharing a particular surname.
  3. ^ a b c d http://www.gro-scotland.gov.uk/files/01surnames_tablea3a.pdf
  4. ^ a b c http://www.gro-scotland.gov.uk/files/01surnames_tablea4.pdf Note: Quote from GROScotSurnames: "Note that McDonald is shown as more common than MacDonald in 1901, although given the uncertainties surrounding the spelling of these names it would seem wrong to regard this as significant."
  5. ^ a b c d http://www.gro-scotland.gov.uk/files/01surnames_tablea3b.pdf
  6. ^ macdonald Families Living in England and Wales in 1891 - Ancestry.com
  7. ^ mcdonald Families Living in England and Wales in 1891 - Ancestry.com
  8. ^ mcdonald Family History Facts 1880 - Ancestry.com
  9. ^ macdonald Family History Facts 1880 - Ancestry.com
  10. ^ mcdonald Family History Facts 1840 - Ancestry.com
  11. ^ macdonald Family History Facts 1840 - Ancestry.com