Usage As A Given or Family Name
As a given name, Erin is used for both sexes, although, given its origins, it is principally used as a feminine forename. It first became a popular given name in the United States. Erin is also a name for Ireland in Welsh, and is one of the 20 most popular girls' names in Wales.
As a family name, Erin has been used as one of the many spellings of the name of the Scottish clan "Irwin" - which was involved in the Scottish Plantations of Ireland. However, their name was originally derived from the place of the same name near Dumfries, and means "green water", from Brittonic ir afon.
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Famous quotes containing the words usage and/or family:
“Pythagoras, Locke, Socrates—but pages
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“... a family I know ... bought an acre in the country on which to build a house. For many years, while they lacked the money to build, they visited the site regularly and picnicked on a knoll, the site’s most attractive feature. They liked so much to visualize themselves as always there, that when they finally built they put the house on the knoll. But then the knoll was gone. Somehow they had not realized they would destroy it and lose it by supplanting it with themselves.”
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