Origin and popularity of the name ROSSELL

Origin

Rossell : 1: English (of Norman origin): from the Anglo-Norman French personal name Ros(c)el a diminutive of Rosce (see Ross). Compare the double diminutive Roscelin with which Ro(s)cel or Ros(s)el was probably freely interchangeable.2: English (of Norman origin): habitational name from Rosel in Calvados.3: English: variant of Russell with which the name in 1 above was easily confused.4: English: habitational name from Rossall in Poulton Le Fylde (Lancashire). The etymology of the placename may derive from Old Norse hross ‘horse’ + hali ‘tail’ in the sense ‘narrow strip of land’ or from a British word related to Welsh rhos ‘moor heath plain’ + Old English halh ‘nook corner of land’. The land is low-lying and level forming a headland between the Wyre and the sea. The name was easily confused with Russell.5: English: perhaps a habitational name from Rossall (Shropshire) probably from Old English hros ‘horse’ + halh. It is not clear whether this surname has survived into modern times.6: Catalan: nickname for someone with red hair from a diminutive of ros ‘red’.7: Catalan: possibly also a habitational name from Rossell a town in Castelló de la Plana.8: Americanized form of German French Dutch and Flemish Rossel or of its German archaic variant Roszel.

Rosewell : 1: in the absence of any evidence for a place named Ro(w)sewell or Ros(e)will this is perhaps a hypercorrect variant of Rowsell (see Rossell) on the analogy of place-names where pronunciation of -well is colloquially reduced to -el. The variation is explicit in Mathewe Rowsell 1561 John Rowswell 1599 in IGI (North Petherton Somerset) and perhaps in Jeffery Rossell 1574 Geffery Rossell 1631 John Rosewell 1654 Thomas Roswell 1655 in IGI (Wilne Derbys). Historically Rossell is well evidenced in Derbys and in SW England including 14th-century Somerset. 2: an occasional late variant of Rosewall.

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Last name frequency

Geographic distribution of the 9,205 individuals with the name ROSSELL on Geneanet.

This last name in the family trees

See below the Geneanet members' family trees which contain the last name ROSSELL