Word.ws English Dictionary

Selwyn

Selwyn proper noun: a surname transferred from the given name. Also the ellipsis of Selwyn College.

Proper noun

Selwyn

  1. A surname transferred from the given name.
  2. A male given name from Old English transferred back from the surname, in quiet use since the 19th century.
  3. A river in Canterbury, New Zealand, named after Bishop George Selwyn; in full, Selwyn River.
  4. A small settlement on the south side of the river in Canterbury, New Zealand.
  5. A territorial authority of Canterbury, New Zealand, named after the river; in full, Selwyn District.
  6. A locality, formerly a mining town in the Shire of Cloncurry, Queensland, Australia, named after the Selwyn Range.
  7. A locality in Alpine Shire, north eastern Victoria, Australia.
  8. A township in Peterborough County, Ontario, Canada, renamed from Smith-Ennismore-Lakefield in 2013.
  9. An unincorporated community in Mingo County, West Virginia, United States.

Also used as

Selwyn is also the ellipsis of Selwyn College.

Origin of Selwyn

From the Middle English form of Latin Silvanus. Also from the Old English given name Selewine, from sel (“hall”) + wine (“friend”). The places are named after bearers of the surname.

Words formed from Selwyn

Questions about Selwyn

What does Selwyn mean?
Selwyn means a surname transferred from the given name.
What part of speech is Selwyn?
Selwyn is a proper noun.

Words near Selwyn in the dictionary

  1. Selway
  2. Selways
  3. Selwood
  4. Selwoods
  5. Selworthy
  6. Selwyn
  7. selwynite
  8. sely
  9. Selydove
  10. SELZ
  11. Selzer

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: Selwyn (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:

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