Northcote

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A family name borne by several notable people, such as the 19th-century painter James Northcote ; a suburb of cities in Australia and New Zealand
2. Originally a surname held by figures like the English painter James Northcote ; a residential locality in Melbourne and Auckland areas
3. A surname carried by various British individuals, including an English portrait painter ; a name given to suburban districts in Victoria and New Zealand

Etymology: Northcote is a surname and place name rather than a common word, and its history lies in a plain compound. It joins Old English "norþ", meaning "north", with "cot", a word for a cottage or small dwelling. A "northcote" was therefore a cottage lying to the north of some other settlement or landmark, the kind of descriptive label that English villages and their residents often took on. The name is a doublet of "Norcott" and "Northcott", two other spellings of the same compound that developed in different forms over time. Doublets arise when one word reaches a language along two routes, or when spelling and pronunciation drift apart, and here the variation simply reflects how the same locational name was written and said in different places.