Holt (surname)
Etymology
Holt is a surname and placename, of Proto-Germanic origin and meaning a small wood or grove of trees.[1] It derives from the Old English word holt and is a near-synonym of "wold" (from Old English wald), originally denoting a forested upland. Those words are cognate with the modern German words "Holz" and "Wald" respectively.[citation needed]
The word is also found in Scandinavian placenames and in surnames derived from them: in Danish, Norwegian, and Icelandic as Holt (or the more archaic Danish Holdt and Holte); in Swedish as Hult or Hulte; and even in Finnish as Hulti (a loanword from Swedish). It is often used in combination with other words, as in Uhrenholdt ("ancient holt", a Danish last name taken from that of an estate) or Älghult ("elk holt"), a village and the site of a small art-glass factory in Småland, Sweden. In Sweden it is most commonly found in and around Småland, including Älmhult, the location of the first IKEA store.[citation needed]
Another spelling of the name is "Hoult", more commonly found in the north of England than in the south.
Related German names include Holz, Holzman, Holzhauer, et al., and their anglicized equivalents which often insert a "t" between the "l" and the "z".[citation needed]
Notable people named Holt
- Alfred Holt (1829–1911), English steamship designer and ship owner
- Alfred Holt (cricketer) (1863–1942), English cricketer
- Anne Holt (born 1958), Norwegian crime novelist and lawyer
- Andrew Holt (disambiguation), several people
- Arthur Holt (sportsman) (1911–1994), Hampshire cricketer and Southampton footballer
- Arthur Holt (politician) (1914–1995), English politician
- Benjamin Holt (1849–1920), American machinery inventor
- Bob Holt (disambiguation), several people
- Brian Van Holt (born 1969), American actor
- Brock Holt (born 1988), American baseball player
- Chad Holt (1972–2019), American actor, writer, and criminal
- Charles A. Holt, behavioral economist
- Charles C. Holt (1921–2010), professor at McCombs School of Business, Texas
- Charlotte C. Holt, American activist and lawyer
- Chris Holt (baseball coach) (born 1979), American baseball coach
- Chris Holt (ice hockey) (born 1985), goaltender
- Claire Holt (born 1988), Australian actress
- David Holt (musician) (born 1946), American musician
- Edwin Holt (1873–1946), Harvard professor of philosophy and psychology
- Elinor Holt, voice actress
- Ernest William Lyons Holt (1864–1922)
- Fritz Holt (1940-1987), American theatre producer and director
- Gary Holt (footballer) (born 1973)
- Gary Holt (musician) (born 1964)
- Grant Holt (born 1981), English footballer
- Gwynneth Holt (1909-1995), British artist
- Hamilton Holt (1872–1951), former president of Rollins College
- Harold Holt (1908–1967), Prime Minister of Australia
- Harold Holt (impresario) (1885–1953), South African-English impresario
- Hazel Holt (1928–2015), British novelist
- Helen F. Holt (1913–2015), American politician
- Henry Holt (North Dakota politician) (1887–1944), lieutenant governor
- Henry Holt (publisher), of Baltimore, US; founded Henry Holt and Company (now Holt McDougal)
- Henry E. Holt (born 1929), astronomer
- Henry H. Holt (1831–1898), Michigan politician, lieutenant governor
- Henry W. Holt, Associate Justice and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Virginia
- Herbert Samuel Holt (1856–1941), former president of the Royal Bank of Canada
- Herbert Holt, rugby league footballer of the 1920s
- Homer A. Holt (1898–1975), American politician
- Jack Holt (actor) (1888–1951)
- Jack Holt (dinghy designer) (1912–1995)
- Jefferson Holt, former manager of rock band R.E.M.
- Jennifer Holt (1920–1997), American actress
- Jim Holt (Arkansas politician) (born 1965)
- JoBea Way Holt (born 1954), planetary scientist
- John Holt (disambiguation), various people
- Joseph Holt (1807–1894), American judge
- Joseph Holt (rebel) (1756–1826), United Irish general
- Justice Holt (disambiguation)
- Kåre Holt (1916–1997), Norwegian author
- Kristen Holt, Canadian educator and Abercrombie & Fitch model
- Lester Holt (born 1959), American news journalist
- Lou Holtz, American college football coach
- Luther Emmett Holt (1855–1924), pediatrician and author
- Luther Emmett Holt Jr. (1895–1974), pediatrician
- Marjorie Holt (1920–2018), United States representative from Maryland
- Maxwell Holt (born 1987), American volleyball player
- Michael Holt (author) (born 1929)
- Michael Holt (musician) (born 1968)
- Michael Holt (snooker player) (born 1978)
- Mike Holt (1931–2008), South African boxer (birth name Antione Michael Holthausen)
- Mister Terrific (Michael Holt), fictional character in the DC Universe
- Nancy Holt (1938–2014), American artist
- Olivia Holt (born 1997), American actress
- Orrin Holt (1792–1855), United States representative from Connecticut
- Peter Holt (born 1948), American businessman
- Pierce Holt (born 1962), American football player
- Randy Holt (born 1953), Canadian ice hockey player
- Ric Holt, Canadian computer scientist
- Robert Holt (1913–1985), American academic author
- Rod Holt (born 1934), American computer engineer
- Rosie Holt, British actress, comedian and writer
- Rush D. Holt, Jr., a U.S. Representative from New Jersey
- Rush D. Holt, Sr., a U.S. Senator from West Virginia
- Ryves Holt (1696–1763), Chief Justice of the Delaware Supreme Court
- Sam B. Holt (1902–?), American college basketball coach
- Sandrine Holt (born 1972), model and actress
- Seth Holt (1923–1971), British film director and producer
- Simeon ten Holt (1923–2012), Dutch composer
- Simma Holt (1922–2015), Canadian journalist and politician
- Simon Holt (born 1958), British composer
- Sophia Holt (1658–1734), Dutch painter
- Steve Holt (disambiguation), several people
- Terrence Holt (born 1980), American football player; younger brother of Torry Holt
- Terrence Holt (writer), American writer
- Thomas Holt (American architect), American architect
- Thomas Holt (English architect), English architect
- Thomas Michael Holt (1831–1896), textile manufacturer, whose company later became part of Burlington Industries
- Tim Holt (1919–1973), American actor
- Tim Holt (statistician) (born 1943)
- Tom Holt (born 1961), British novelist
- Torry Holt (born 1976), American football player; older brother of Terrence Holt
- Victor Holt (1908–1988), American basketball player
- Victoria Holt, pseudonym of Eleanor Alice Burford Hibbert, British author
- William Holt (disambiguation), several people
- Yvette Holt (born 1971), Australian poet
Notable people with variants of the name
- Axel Petersson Döderhultarn (born Axel Petersson; 1868–1925), Swedish woodcarver
- Laura Pendergest-Holt (born 1973), convicted Ponzi scheme operator
- Jacob Holdt (born 1947), Danish photojournalist
- Johan Hultin (born 1924), Swedish-American pathologist
- Astrid Uhrenholdt Jacobsen, Norwegian Olympic cross-country skier
Places with names derived from Holt and variants
- Älmhult Municipality, Kronoberg County, Sweden
- Diepholz town and capital of the district of Diepholz, in Lower Saxony, Germany
- Döderhult, parish in Oskarshamn Municipality, Kalmar County, Sweden; Misterhult is a nearby parish
- Oskarshamn, city, earlier called Döderhultsvik (orig. Duderhultevik), after the nearby bay, which is still called Döderhultsvik (vik=bay)
- Esholt, a village in the City of Bradford in the metropolitan county of West Yorkshire, England
- Holte, northern suburb of Metropolitan Copenhagen, Rudersdal municipality, Denmark
- Hult, a village in Eksjö Municipality, Jönköping County, Sweden
- Hultsfred, seat of Hultsfred Municipality, Kalmar County, Sweden and location of the Hultsfred Festival
- Northolt, a suburb of North London (formerly in Middlesex)
- Reykholt, Iceland (reyk=smoke)
- Råshult village, Kronoberg County, Småland, Sweden, birthplace of Carl Linnaeus
- Stenbrohult, the parish in which Råshult is located
- Schloß Holte-Stukenbrock, town in the district of Gütersloh in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany
- Skálholt (Old Icelandic: Skálaholt) important historical site in southeast Iceland
See also
References
This page lists people with the surname Holt.
If an internal link intending to refer to a specific person led you to this page, you may wish to change that link by adding the person's given name(s) to the link.
If an internal link intending to refer to a specific person led you to this page, you may wish to change that link by adding the person's given name(s) to the link.