HORRIGAN
Horrigan is a surname of purely Irish origin, deriving from the Gaelic patronymic Ó hArgáin, which translates into English as “descendant of Argán”. The personal name Argán is believed to stem from the Gaelic word arg, meaning “silver”. The surname is comparatively rare, with the majority of bearers historically settled in County Clare and County Limerick.
In the early modern period, the name appeared in a variety of orthographic forms, including Harrigan from Listowel, Horgan in Cork, Horrigan in Kenmare and Mallow, Hourihane from Cork, Hourigan in Limerick and Organ from Cashel. These spellings exhibit the common tendency for Gaelic surnames to be anglicised in accordance with local dialectal pronunciation. The precise meaning of the name is considered obscure; one suggested derivation is “descendant of the son of the grey haired one”.
The name is predominantly associated with the province of Munster, though a sept bearing the form O’hArragdain is documented in County Leix during the Middle Ages. Records from the year 1890 indicate that of the sixty‑six Italian baptisms recognised in Ireland, forty were registered in County Cork and twenty‑one in County Kerry, underscoring the concentration of the surname in southern Ireland.
There are four localities within County Kerry known as Ballyhorgan, all situated in the barony of Clanmaurice. The 1901 Census lists one hundred and two households carrying the surname in that county, suggesting a relatively sizeable cluster of families at the turn of the twentieth century.
The Horgans constitute a notable family within Ross, County Cork, though the Gaelic element O’ is currently rarely evident in the surviving records. An example of early documentation is the christening of Daniel Horgan on 19 November 1789 at Killarney Roman Catholic Church, County Kerry. The earliest recorded spelling of the family name is believed to be that of David O’ Horegane, dated 1551 in County Leix, Ireland, during the reign of King Edward V, who reigned from 1547 to 1553.
Typical given names associated with the Horrigan surname
Male
- Andrew
- Anthony
- Brian
- Daniel
- James
- John
- Mark
- Michael
- Neale
- Paul
- Thomas
- William
Female
- Caroline
- Elizabeth
- Jeanette
- Jeannette
- Jennifer
- Joan
- Julie
- Leanne
- Margaret
- Melanie
- Patricia
- Sarah
- Susan
- Vivienne
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 Horrigan in...
Braille
⠓⠕⠗⠗⠊⠛⠁⠝
Morse
....---.-..-...--..--.
Semaphore
There are approximately 763 people named Horrigan in the UK. That makes it roughly the 9,094th most common surname in Britain. Around 12 in a million people in Britain are named Horrigan.
Origin: Celtic
Region of origin: British Isles
Country of origin: Ireland
Religion of origin: Christian
Language of origin: Gaelic
Famous people named Horrigan
- Darren Horrigan - 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.