Gorman
Variations – O’Gorman, MacGorman
Racial Origin – Irish
Source – A given name
“M’Gomain” is the Gaelic form of this family name. The Anglicized development of which vary from the original principally by the elimination of the “i” and in most cases the dropping of the “Mac” or the “O.”
The given name from which the family name was formed, at first as a clan name was “Gorman,” exactly the same as the form of the family name most frequently met with today. The ending “main” instead of “man” in the Gaelic clan name is merely inflection. The possessive case of the given name, of course, had to be used in connection with the prefix “Mac” (“son of”). The given name had a meaning of “illustrious.”
One of the most powerful clans of ancient Ireland, from both the influential and numerical point of view, was that of the “O’Connors,” and a great many of the Irish clans formed at a later period were branches of the O’Connors. The MacGormains were one of these. It was formed, apparently, about 650 A.D., and its founder was a direct descendant of “Cathair Mor,” an O’Connor who was King of Leinster and the 109th monarch of all Ireland in 119 A.D.
The MacGormains themselves, however, became a very powerful clan throughout the Middle Ages.
