Frequency: (2525)
(number of times this surname appears in a sample database of 88.7 million names, representing one third of the 1997 US population)
English and Scottish: habitational name from any of various places called Colton in England, perhaps also Colton House in Scotland. Examples in Norfolk, Staffordshire, and North Yorkshire are from the Old English personal name Cola (or the cognate Old Norse Koli; see Cole 2) + Old English tūn ‘enclosure’, ‘settlement’. The place so named in Somerset has as its first element the Old English personal name Cūla (of uncertain origin). The one in Cumbria has a river name apparently derived from a Celtic word meaning ‘hazel’.
See the Key to the Dictionary or consult the General Introduction for further explanation.
