O'Hanlon: Surname History and Family Crest

A coat of arms belongs to a particular family line rather than to everyone named O'Hanlon, so the heraldry linked to Hanlon is a starting point, not an automatic right.

What O'Hanlon means

Before spelling settled in the modern era, so Hanlon could easily become O'Hanlon. In origin, the name means “Descendant of Anluan ("great champion")”.

The O' in front of the name is a particle that was often added to Hanlon on registers. Regional accents shaped spellings long before dictionaries fixed them. The same family of names includes Handlon and Hanlan. 2,063 Americans were listed as O'Hanlon in the 2010 census. That is enough to place it in the top 25,000 American surnames.

For the full story, order the O'Hanlon surname pack.