Jocelyn

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A given name typically assigned to females, often used to identify individuals in English-speaking cultures ; a proper noun referring to any person named thus ; occasionally a surname passed through family lineage
2. A personal designation commonly used to name girls, serving as an identifier in social and legal contexts ; a term representing any individual known by this appellation ; sometimes found as a last name in genealogical records
3. A feminine label used to address or refer to someone ; functioning as a distinctive personal name in various records, conversations, and documents ; sporadically appearing as a familial surname within certain lineages

Etymology: Jocelyn began as a medieval man's name. Old French "Joscelin" was a diminutive of names beginning with "Gaut," the tribal name of the Geats, a Germanic people whose name is traced to a Proto-Germanic root meaning roughly "Goth." The name was carried into Breton use as well, where it was linked to the Breton name Josse, which is the source of the English surname Joyce. The name survived for centuries as a family surname before it was revived as a given name in the nineteenth century. Its modern association with girls is a reversal of its original use for boys. In the United States among Hispanic communities, and in the Philippines, the name is now widely given to girls, and a folk etymology has linked it to José, as though it were a feminine diminutive of that name. That connection is popular folk belief rather than the name's documented history.