Word.ws English Dictionary

Sullivan

/ˈsʌlɪvən/

Sullivan proper noun: a surname from Irish. Also the ellipsis of Sullivan County.

Proper noun

Sullivan (countable and uncountable, plural Sullivans)

  1. A surname from Irish.
    • "Directoritis strikes again!" bemoans Dan Sullivan, who believes that the director of Wallace Shawn's Aunt Dan and Lemon replaces the characters' intellectual and verbal energy with "transparent rationalizations for the personal hang-ups of the characters […]1988, Richard H. Palmer, The Critics' Canon: Standards of Theatrical Reviewing in America
    • Peterik’s co-writer, Frankie Sullivan, was also upset about the use of “Eye of the Tiger” and posted a message on Facebook to vent. […] Sullivan wasn’t having it.2015 September 9, Todd Leopold, “Band unhappy with use of ‘Eye of the Tiger’ for Kim Davis”, in CNN, archived from the original on 27 May 2023
  2. A city, the county seat of Moultrie County, Illinois, United States.
  3. A city, the county seat of Sullivan County, Indiana, United States.
  4. A town in Hancock County, Maine, United States.
  5. A town in Cheshire County, New Hampshire, United States.

Also used as

Sullivan is also the ellipsis of Sullivan County.

Forms of Sullivan

pluralSullivans
alternative formSullivant

Origin of Sullivan

Clipping of O'Sullivan. From Irish Ó Súilleabháin.

Words formed from Sullivan

Questions about Sullivan

What does Sullivan mean?
Sullivan means a surname from Irish.
What part of speech is Sullivan?
Sullivan is a proper noun.
How do you pronounce Sullivan?
Sullivan is pronounced /ˈsʌlɪvən/.

Words near Sullivan in the dictionary

  1. Sulligent
  2. sulling
  3. Sullinger
  4. Sullingers
  5. Sullington
  6. Sullivan
  7. Sullivan County
  8. Sullivan Harbor
  9. Sullivanian
  10. Sullivanians
  11. Sullivans

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: Sullivan (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-Sullivan.wav.

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