David Houghton

(male) Biblical name, borne by the greatest of all the kings of Israel, whose history is recounted with great vividness in the first and second books of Samuel and elsewhere. As a boy he killed the giant Philistine Goliath with his slingshot. As king of Judah, and later of all Israel, he expanded the power of the Israelites and established the security of their kingdom. He was also noted as a poet, many of the Psalms being attributed to him. The Hebrew derivation of the name is uncertain; it is said by some to represent a nursery word meaning ‘darling’. It is a very popular Jewish name, but is almost equally common among Gentiles in the English-speaking world. It is particularly common in Wales and Scotland, having been borne by the patron saint of Wales (see Dewi) and by two medieval kings of Scotland.

English: habitational name from any of the various places so called. The majority, with examples in at least fourteen counties, get the name from Old English hōh ‘ridge’, ‘spur’ (literally ‘heel’) + tūn ‘enclosure’, ‘settlement’. Haughton in Nottinghamshire also has this origin, and may have contributed to the surname. A smaller group of Houghtons, with examples in Lancashire and South Yorkshire, have as their first element Old English halh ‘nook’, ‘recess’. In the case of isolated examples in Devon and East Yorkshire, the first elements appear to be unattested Old English personal names or bynames, of which the forms approximate to Huhha and Hofa respectively, but the meanings are unknown.