Owing to the fact that place names of this form occur in France it has been customary to trace the Gordons to a continental soerce. The earliest known home of the Scots family was in Berwickshire, and here we find a place name Gordon, from which the surname may have been derived. There was also a distinguished family named Gurdon in Hampshire, England, with whom it has been suggested they were connected. It has been further suggested that the Gordons were cadets of the Swintons as the coats of arms borne by the two families are the same. "Could this descent be established, the antiquity of the Gordons would be assured by tracing their ancestry through Ernulf of Swinton (the assumed father of Richard and Adam) and Odard of Bamburgh up to Waltheof the Saxon earl of Northumberland in 968, a pedigree which might account for their early traditions" (Sc. Peer., IV, p. 507) The first Gordon recorded in Scotland is Richer de Gordun, lord of the berony of Gordon in the Merse. Between 1150—60 he granted a piece of land and the church of S. Michael to the monks of Kelso, a grant confirmed by his son, Thomas de Gordun (Kelso, 118,126). Adam de Gordun, probably a brother, along with Richer or Richard witnessed the quitclaim of lands of Swinton by Patrick, first earl of Dunbar (Raine, 117). The Gordons are by most writers referred to as a 'clan', but they have not the slightest claim to be considered as such the relation of their followers to the chief was entirely feudalistic. William Gordon, a Scot, was mate and ice-pilot of the Danish attempt to find the North-West passage in 1619. The Polish family of Gordon now living at Ycon are descended from Nathaniel Gordon who left Scotland in 1707 (Fischer I, p. 58). The late Dr. J. M. Bulloch compiled an exhaustive work on the Gordons, The House of Gordon Aberdeen, 1903—12 in 3 v. Sir Alexander Seton in 1408 married Elizabeth Gordon and became the ancestor of the house of Huntly."He spent much of his time in Aberdeenshire, where he greatly extended the Gordon lands and laid the foundations of a strong clan following. He is said to have rewarded all who took the name of Gordon, and became his vassals, with a gift of meal, whence certain branches of the clan were called the 'Bow o' Meal' Gordons, just as the 'Jok' and 'Tam' Gordons distinguished the collateral or illegitimate descendants of the original stock. It is only by such a process of adoption that the large number of Gordon families existing as early as the latter half of the fifteenth century can be accounted for" (Watt, History of Aberdeen and Banff, Edinburgh, 1900, p. 86). A correspondent in a recent issue (1943) of the London Times has made the absurd suggestion that the name is derived from Gordium in Phrygia and was introduced into Britain by a returned crusader.

1 belonging to Gordon (Berwickshire), 13th cent.Gordun=? the Gore-Hill [Old Englishgára, a three-cornered or wedge-shaped piece of land + dún, a hill] 2 the French Gourdon: v. Gurdon.

The Berwickshire place-name has been much discussed by Scottish writers, who propose various Celtic derivations (See Notes and Queries for 1902, esp. 29th March); but practically all the place- names in the vicinity of Gordon are English.

This Scottish surname has been used as a synonym of Magournahan i.e. Mag Mhuirneacháin which also takes the form MacGourneson in Co. Down. Bibl; MIF 282*

(1) Place name in Scotland. (2) As Jewish name corruption of Grodno in Russia.

(Scottish, English) The man from Gordon (spacious hill), in Scotland; one who lived on, or near, a three-cornered hill or wedge-shaped piece of land.

(an invented surname) There is no satisfactory explanation for the derivation of the name Gordon. The name Jordan appears in central Europe in the fifteenth century and some take Gordin, Gordan, Gordon as variants of the Biblical river. The name Gordon, which is widespread among non-Jews in England, is believed to have been introduced there by a Christian order, Gordano, which came from Italy (Gordano is the Italian name for the river Jordan). Some believe that Jews coming from the city and district of Grodno in Russian Poland would ordinarily be called Grodner, but instead of assuming the name Grodner they chose Gordon. I believe that the most logical explanation is the following: the word for “town” in Russian is gorod. Gorodin means “townsman” and this became Gordin and Gordon, the last especially under English influence.

According to some genealogists this name is derived from Gordonia, a town in Macedonia; according to others from a manor in Normandy-origins literally too "far-fetched," since the parish of Gordon, in Berwickshire, where we find the family located at an early date, is its true source. "There is a nice little romance to the tune of making the founder of the family a certain Bertrand de Gourdon, who shot Richard the Lion-Hearted at Chaluz. According to history, this Gourdon was a common archer, who having been brought before the dying monarch was forgiven by him, and ordered to be liberated with a handsome present; but the Flemish general, who had no notion of such generosity, very coolly ordered him to be flayed alive. How, after such an operation, he could get into Scotland we are not told." N. and Q., Nov. 1, 1856. The cheerfulness of this family is exhibited in the proverb, Tub Gay Gordons.

A round hill; from gour, round, and dun, a hill. The family are descended from Adam Gordon, Lord of Gordon in Berwickshire, and of Strathbogy, in Aberdeenshire, temp. Robert Bruce.

Gurtduine, Gaelic, a fierce man; Gwrddyn, Welsh, a strong man; Cawrdyn, Welsh, a hero, a giant.

Some have derived the Gordons from Gordinia, in Thessaly; others say they are descendants of the Gorduni mentioned by Cæsar in his Commentaries. The name appears to be local, and may be derived from a town in France of that name, in the Department of Lot. It signifies in Gaelic the round hill, or the hill that surrounds, from Gour, round, and dun, a hill or fort.

1. From Gordon, Berwick, granted c. 1130 to a family of Anglo - Norman origin (Douglas). 2. A branch of the Norman family of Say, deriving from Picot de Say living 1030, whose son, Robert Fitz-Picot, Lord of Aunay, was cofounder of St. Martin, Seez, 1060. He had issue, who came to England at the Conquest, 1, Picot, Baron of Clun and Stoke-Say, Salop; 2, Robert Fitz-Picot; 3, William de Say, ancestor of the Lords Say in England. Robert Fitz-Picot, Baron of Brunne, Cambridge, 1086, had issue, 1, Robert Fitz-Picot, the Viscount, who forfeited the Barony of Brune, t. Henry I.; 2, Saher de Say, who is stated to have taken refuge in Scotland, and obtained grants from Alexander I., named after him Sayton. Alexander, his son, was a baron of Sayton and Wynton (Chalmers, Cal. i. 517; Douglas, Peerage). From him descended the Lords Seyton or Seton, Earls of Wintoun and Dunfermline, Viscounts Kingston, and (under the name of Gordon) Marquises of Huntley and Dukes of Gordon. Gordon is a clan name, and is of course chiefly borne by persons of Celtic race.

(Scotch), Goirtean, Little cornfield. The parish of Gordon is in the co. Berwick; and the founder of the family so called, who came from England, temp. Day. I., obtained from him the lands from which the name was taken.

A location name in Berwick.

Gordon: is De Gourdon, from a small town on the Limestone Causses in Quercy. The Gourdons must have come to England at the time of the English occupation of Guienne. They did wisely to abandon the sterile plateau for the lush plains of England. The first heard of is Adam de Gourdon, “the King’s servant” under Richard I. The Scottish Gordons, however, assert that they derive from another Anglo-Norman family seated at Gordon in Berwickshire. But Adam has been for generations a Christian name in both Gordon families, that in Scotland and that seated in Suffolk. Richard was Baron of Gordon in the Merse in the middle of the twelfth century. The Gordons have their tartan and their badge, rock-ivy.