Word.ws English Dictionary

Mortimer

/ˈmɔːtɪmə/US/ˈmɔɹtəmɚ/

Mortimer proper noun: a British surname from Old French.

Proper noun

Mortimer

  1. A British surname from Old French.
    • He said he would not ransom Mortimer; / Forbade my tongue to speak of Mortimer; / But I will find him when he lies asleep, / And in his ear I'll holla ‘Mortimer!’c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Fourth, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and...
  2. A male given name transferred from the surname.
    • I like the names Herbert and Mortimer more all the time. They are so distinguished and new and American. Do you know how I came to think of them? I was reading the newspaper in bed after my first boy was born. I was reading the society page, which is always so interesting.1941, Delmore Schwartz, Shenandoah, New Directions, page 13
    • A spokesperson for the families of Drs. Mortimer and Raymond Sackler, the late founders of the company, issued this statement:2019 March 24, Ralph Ellis and Melanie Schuman, “Hundreds of cities, counties and Native American tribes file federal lawsuit against Sackler family over opioid crisis”, in CNN
  3. A village in Stratfield Mortimer parish, West Berkshire district, Berkshire, England, otherwise known as Mortimer Common (OS grid ref SU6564).
  4. A ghost town in Caldwell County, North Carolina, United States.
  5. An unincorporated community in Allen Township, Hancock County, Ohio, United States.
  6. A community in Kent County, New Brunswick, Canada.

Forms of Mortimer

alternative formMortymer

Origin of Mortimer

A habitational surname from Mortemer in France, from Old Northern French, literally meaning “dead pond”.

Words formed from Mortimer

Questions about Mortimer

What does Mortimer mean?
Mortimer means a British surname from Old French.
What part of speech is Mortimer?
Mortimer is a proper noun.
How do you pronounce Mortimer?
Mortimer is pronounced /ˈmɔːtɪmə/ (UK).

Words near Mortimer in the dictionary

  1. mortifieth
  2. mortify
  3. mortifying
  4. mortifyingly
  5. mortifyings
  6. Mortimer
  7. Mortimer's Cross
  8. Mortimore
  9. Mortimores
  10. mortise
  11. mortise gear

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: Mortimer (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-Mortimer.wav.

Cite this entry: “Mortimer.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/mortimer. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.