OSCAR PENNINGTON

Old Irish name, which is borne in the Fenian sagas by a grandson of Finn mac Cumhaill (Finn MacCool). It was resuscitated by the antiquarian poet James Macpherson (1736–96), author of the Ossian poems. It is now also a characteristically Scandinavian name; it was introduced to Sweden because Napoleon, an admirer of the works of Macpherson, imposed the name on his godson Oscar Bernadotte, who became King Oscar I of Sweden in 1844 (see also Malvina). In more recent times it has been associated particularly with the Irish writer and wit Oscar Wilde (1854–1900), and with the annual awards for achievement in the film industry made by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Oscar is one of a number of Celtic names that have recently come into general use and have become increasingly popular since the 1990s.

English (chiefly Lancashire and Cumbria): habitational name from places called Pennington, in Lancashire, Cumbria, and Hampshire. The latter two are so called from Old English pening ‘penny’ (Penny) (used as a byname or from a tribute due on the land) + tūn ‘enclosure’, ‘settlement’. The place of this name in the parish of Leigh in Lancashire is recorded in the 13th century as Pinington and Pynington, and may be from Old English Pinningtūn ‘settlement (tūn) associated with a man named Pinna’.