Explore the Family Name Winthrop

The meaning of Winthrop

English (Cumberland and Durham): habitational name from any of the places in Lincolnshire and Nottinghamshire called Winthorpe. The former is named with the Old English personal name or byname Wine, meaning ‘friend’, + Old Norse thorp ‘settlement’. The Lincolnshire placename probably derives from the Old English personal name Wine + Old Norse thorp ‘secondary settlement, outlying farmstead’. The Nottinghamshire placename derives from the Old English personal name Wīgmund or the Old Norse personal name Vígmundr + Old Norse thorp. History: John Winthrop (1588–1649) was the first governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. He kept a detailed journal, an invaluable source for historians. He was born into a gentry family in Suffolk, England, whose fortunes were founded by his grandfather Adam Winthrop (died 1562) of Lavenham. In 1544 the latter acquired a 500-acre estate that had been part of the monastery of Bury St. Edmunds. John Winthrop was a Puritan who emigrated from Groton, Suffolk, to Salem, MA, in 1630 because of Charles I’s anti-Puritan policies. By the time of his death he had had four wives and 16 children, the most notable of whom was his son John (1606–76), a scientist and governor of CT. His descendants were prominent in politics and science, including John Winthrop (1714–79), an astronomer, and Robert Winthrop (1809–94), a senator and speaker of the US House of Representatives.

Dictionary of American Family Names, 2nd edition, © Oxford University Press, 2022.