Telford

Telford proper noun: a characteristical surname.

Proper noun

Telford (countable and uncountable, plural Telfords)

(countable) A characteristical surname.
A new town in Telford and Wrekin borough and the ceremonial county of Shropshire, England, named after Thomas Telford (OS grid ref SJ7008).
A locality in the Shire of Moira, Victoria, Australia.
A borough in Bucks County and Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, named after Thomas Telford.
A census-designated place in Washington County, Tennessee, named after state senator George Whitfield Telford.
An unincorporated community in Lincoln County, Washington, named after cattleman M. A Telford.

Noun

Telford (uncountable)

(attributive) A road pavement having a surface of small stone rolled hard and smooth, distinguished from macadam road by its firm foundation of large stones with fragments of stone wedged tightly in the interstices.
- a Telford road

Forms of Telford

plural	Telfords
alternative form	Talford
alternative form	Telfort

Origin of Telford

From Old French taille fer, meaning "(he who) cuts iron" or "iron-cleaver"; used as a nickname for a man who could cleave clean through the armour of his foe. The second syllable was eventually reanalysed as native English 'ford'. * (road): Named after Thomas Telford, a famous civil engineer.

Words formed from Telford

Questions about Telford

What does Telford mean?: Telford means a characteristical surname.
What part of speech is Telford?: Telford can be a proper noun or a noun.

Words near Telford in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: Telford (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: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-uk-Telford.ogg.

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