HOCKING
The surname Hocking is of purely English origin and is largely situated within the British Isles. The earliest attestations place it in England, a country whose language is English and whose Christian population has historically documented names in parish registers and other official records.
One of the most widely accepted etymologies is that Hocking derives from the Old English word hoc, meaning a hook or a bend, combined with the suffix -ing, which indicates a person or descendant. In this light the name would originally have been applied to someone who lived near a hook-shaped geographical feature or a bend in a river. Such a topographic relationship is common in surnames that arose when communities were identified by notable landscape elements.
An alternate source suggests that the surname is a variant of Hockin, itself derived from the personal name Huchin, a diminutive of Hugh. This line of reasoning emphasises the personal-name origin rather than a purely locational one, suggesting a family connection to an ancestor named Hugh. Yet another tradition links Hocking to the medieval nickname Hodge, which is a pet form of the Anglo‑Saxon compound Hroþ‑gēr. The latter translates roughly as fame‑spear, a nickname that became a surname in the eighteenth‑century parish of St Mary Aldermary, London, where a Frances Hockin was recorded in 1591.
Topographic scholars also recognise the Old English term hoh—meaning the spur of a hill—in the explanation of the surname. Combined with the denoting suffix -ing, the name would refer to people living on or near a hill spur. This explanation fits the geographical distribution of the name, which is especially frequent in Cornwall and Devon, the latter being part of the ancient kingdom of Wessex. In that kingdom the name appears early in the thirteenth century under the form Hocing, indicating a person from a place called Hockney.
The historical record shows a series of early spellings and variants that reflect both regional pronunciation and clerical transcription practices. The surname has been documented as Hocking, Hochkin, Hochkins, Hotchkins, Hodgkins, Hodgeskins, Hockin, Hocken and Hoching. The first known instance of the diminutive as a surname is that of Robert Hochekyn of Staffordshire in 1327, followed by Richard Hoggekynes of Norfolk in 1445. In 1690 a John Hotchkiss is found in Staffordshire, and a Richard Roger appears in the 1263 pipe rolls of Kent, signalling the early use of the related name Roger in the region.
During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries emigration from Britain, particularly from the south‑western counties, spread the name to new parts of the English‑speaking world. Concentrations of Hocking now exist in Australia, where the name was carried by settlers and is occasionally found in place names such as Hocking in Western Australia, though this town was named after an early twentieth‑century British setteller and bears no direct link to the surname’s origin. In North America and Canada, smaller clusters of the name can be traced to such migration, though it remains far less common than in its homeland.
Because surnames were often recorded with varying orthography, it is important to recognise that related surnames such as Hawkins, Hockinson, and even the German surname Hochheim may occasionally appear as misspellings or misinterpretations of Hocking in older documents. Consequently, genealogical research for this name must rely on corroborative records—such as parish baptismal, marriage and burial entries, tax lists, and royal licence rolls—to confirm true lineage and to differentiate between distinct families that share a similar phonetic form.
Typical given names associated with the Hocking surname
Male
- Anthony
- Christopher
- David
- John
- Michael
- Paul
- Peter
- Richard
- Stephen
- William
Female
- Angela
- Clare
- Elaine
- Elizabeth
- Emma
- Julie
- Laura
- Lisa
- Margaret
- Mary
- Rebecca
- Sarah
- Susan
Similar and related surnames
Related and similar names are generated algorithmically based on the spelling, and may not necessarily share an etymology.
How to communicate the surname Hocking in...
Braille
⠓⠕⠉⠅⠊⠝⠛
Morse
....----.-.-.-..-.--.
Semaphore
There are approximately 3,644 people named Hocking in the UK. That makes it roughly the 2,535th most common surname in Britain. Around 56 in a million people in Britain are named Hocking.
Surname type: Location or geographical feature
Origin: English
Region of origin: British Isles
Country of origin: England
Religion of origin: Christian
Language of origin: English
Famous people named Hocking
- Gary Hocking - Rhodesian motorcycle racer and racing driver (1937 to 1962)
- Philip Hocking - Politician (1925 to 2008)
- Mary Hocking - Novelist (1921 to 2014)
- Matt Hocking - Football player
- Karl Hocking - Welsh rugby union and rugby league football player
Names and descriptions courtesy of Wikipedia, and may contain errors. This is not intended to be an exhaustive list of every famous person with this name.