Ó Creachmhaoil is an

Irish Irish may refer to: Common meanings * Someone or something of, from, or related to: ** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe ***Éire, Irish language name for the isle ** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...

surname, often anglicised as Craughwell, Croughwell, Crockwell, and Crowell.

Etymology

''Ó'', in Irish surnames, indicates a grandson or descendant of the person whose

given name A given name (also known as a forename or first name) is the part of a personal name quoted in that identifies a person, potentially with a middle name as well, and differentiates that person from the other members of a group (typically a ...

it precedes (as in ''Ó Briain'': ''grandson of Brian''). Creachmhaoil is not used as a given name in Ireland, and is actually a

toponym Toponymy, toponymics, or toponomastics is the study of '' toponyms'' (proper names of places, also known as place names and geographic names), including their origins, meanings, usage and types. Toponym is the general term for a proper name of ...

, composed of two Gaelic words. ''Creach'', which is related to ''craig'', and ''creag'', and the English word '' crag'', refers to a rock (with which word it rhymes), or the bare rock crest of a hill (related words are ''cruach'', for a mountain, pinnacle, or a rounded hill that stands apart...or for any type of pile, or heap, and 'cnoc', for a hill or eminence). An alternate etymology of ''creach'' is ''plunder'', presumably in reference to herds of cattle, which were often targets of thefts and cattle raids amongst the Gaels. The usual Gaelic word for cattle is ''crodh'', often Anglicised in place-names as ''crow'', although the words ''cro'', ''crocharsach'', and ''crò'' are all connected with sheep, sheep enclosures or meadows. A ''maol'' is a round-shaped hill or mountain, bare of trees. It is anglicised as ''mull'', and is common in Irish and Scottish place names such as the

Mull of Kintyre The Mull of Kintyre is the southwesternmost tip of the Kintyre Peninsula (formerly ''Cantyre'') in southwest Scotland. From here, the Antrim coast of Northern Ireland is visible on a calm and clear day, and a historic lighthouse, the second ...

. Gaelic spelling rules require that maol, following creach, be lenited; that is, an h is inserted after the first letter, providing the first letter is a consonant (and not an ''l'', ''n'', or ''r''). This h makes the preceding consonant silent, or changes its sound (''mh'', or ''bh'', for instance, are silent or sound like an English ''v'' or ''w''). Gaelic spelling rules also require that, with the first letter lenited, the last vowel should be slender (an ''i'', or an ''e''). As both vowels in maol are broad (''a'', ''o'', ''u''), an ''i'' is inserted after. These two changes alter the sound of ''maol'' (rhymes with ''mull'') to ''mhaoil'' (rhymes with ''uell'', or ''well''). The sound of the two word together, therefore, sounds to an English ear like ''Crockwell'', or ''Craughwell'', and it is Anglicised thus (the Gaelic personal names ''Seán'' (John) and ''Seamus'' (James) became ''Iain'' and ''Hamish'' in Scotland by similar means). The complete toponym is used, today, to connote the village in Galway, but presumably was adopted from a nearby hill. The village is too small to have been known far afield, and the surname is largely restricted in Ireland to County Galway. ''Ó Creachmhaoil'', therefore, is presumably a

Toponymic surname A toponymic surname or topographic surname is a surname derived from a place name.

adopted by villagers from Creachmhaoil upon their moving to other parts of Galway.

History

It was largely unknown outside of the south-east of

County A county is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposes Chambers Dictionary, L. Brookes (ed.), 2005, Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, Edinburgh in certain modern nations. The term is derived from the Old French ...

Galway Galway ( ; ga, Gaillimh, ) is a city in the West of Ireland, in the province of Connacht, which is the county town of County Galway. It lies on the River Corrib between Lough Corrib and Galway Bay, and is the sixth most populous city on ...

, where the

village A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town (although the word is often used to describe both hamlets and smaller towns), with a population typically ranging from a few hundred ...

of Creachmhaoil is also found, until the latter end of the 19th century when emigres established branches of the family which still thrive in

Cornwall Cornwall (; kw, Kernow ) is a historic county and ceremonial county in South West England. It is recognised as one of the Celtic nations, and is the homeland of the Cornish people. Cornwall is bordered to the north and west by the Atlantic ...

and

Devonshire Devon ( , historically known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial county, ceremonial and non-metropolitan county, non-metropolitan counties of England, county in South West England. The most populous settlement in Devon is the city of Plymouth, ...

(where it is frequently mistaken for a variant of the surname Crocker),

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a populat ...

, and

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

, in

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

, Newfoundland,

Bermuda ) , anthem = "God Save the King" , song_type = National song , song = "Hail to Bermuda" , image_map = , map_caption = , image_map2 = , mapsize2 = , map_caption2 = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = , es ...

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

and Berkshire County,

Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut Massachusett_writing_systems.html" ;"title="nowiki/> məhswatʃəwiːsət.html" ;"title="Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət">Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət'' En ...

, among other places. The surname (rendered ''Cragwell'', ''Crockwell'', ''Crogwell'', ''Crachuell'', ''Crackwell'', ''Crackwill'', ''Crockwill'', ''Crockwile'', ''Crachwell'', and ''Crickwell'') evidently arrived in

Barbados Barbados is an island country in the Lesser Antilles of the West Indies, in the Caribbean region of the Americas, and the most easterly of the Caribbean Islands. It occupies an area of and has a population of about 287,000 (2019 estimate) ...

in the 17th Century (probably as part of the involuntary Irish immigration to Barbados that followed the

Cromwellian invasion of Ireland The Cromwellian conquest of Ireland or Cromwellian war in Ireland (1649–1653) was the re-conquest of Ireland by the forces of the English Parliament, led by Oliver Cromwell, during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms. Cromwell invaded Ireland wi ...

), (the Crockwells of Bermuda descend from a single Barbadian who settled there in the 19th Century, that spelling now appearing to be extinct in Barbados, possibly as a result of re-emigration). Documentation on the origin of the surname is not recorded, but it is doubtless connected to the village.

People

Notable bearers of the name include American painter

Douglass Crockwell Spencer Douglass Crockwell (April 29, 1904, Columbus, Ohio – November 30, 1968, Glens Falls, New York) was an American commercial artist and experimental filmmaker. He was most famous for his illustrations and advertisements for ''The Saturday E ...

, Irish Senator Gerard Craughwell of the

Seanad Éireann Seanad Éireann (, ; "Senate of Ireland") is the upper house of the Oireachtas (the Irish legislature), which also comprises the President of Ireland and Dáil Éireann (the lower house). It is commonly called the Seanad or Senate and its memb ...

, Bermudian parliamentarian Shawn Crockwell, JP, MP, FIFA-certified Bermudian football referee, Carlyle McNeil Eugene Crockwell, Bermudian footballers ''Denzel Crockwell'' (of ''Ireland Rangers FC''), and

Mikkail Crockwell Mikkail Kristopher Crockwell (born February 20, 1990) is a Bermudian footballer, who currently plays for local side Dandy Town Hornets. Club career Crockwell played for Dandy Town Hornets and joined St. David's Cricket Club in 2011. He has al ...

(of Dandy Town FC and Bermuda Hogges FC), Bermudian cricketer Fiqre Crockwell, English cricketer Leslie Crockwell, Guinness World Record holding rower Matthew Craughwell, Newfoundland photographer Chris Crockwell, Newfoundland-born author Marion Anderson (born Marion Crockwell), American author Thomas J. Craughwell, film director and actor Charles Croughwell, actress ''Callie Marie Croughwell'', and her actor brothers, ''Joshua Croughwell'' and ''Cameron Croughwell'', sword-maker Michael "Irish Mike" Craughwell (star of the Discovery Channel television series Big Giant Swords), and educator and

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the U ...

film critic Kathleen Craughwell,.Los Angeles Times: Kathleen Craughwell
/ref>

References

External links

1900 Massachusetts Census, Berkshire County, City of Adams
{{DEFAULTSORT:O Creachmhaoil Surnames Surnames of Irish origin Irish families Irish-language surnames