Entry № 4964 · Germanic origin

Jocelyn Jocelyn — Meaning, Origin & Baby Name Popularity

/ JOSS-eh-lin /
Gender
Girl
Origin
Germanic
Meaning
"Of the Gauts (a Germanic tribe)"
Syllables
3
First recorded
Medieval (French)

A name that means "of the gauts (a germanic tribe)".

Jocelyn comes from the medieval Old French Joscelin — itself from the Germanic Gauzlin, referring to a member of the Gauts (an East Germanic tribe). It was originally a masculine name; English usage made it predominantly feminine.

Jocelyn entered the U.S. top 1000 in 1942 and has risen steadily. Today it sits in the U.S. top 200.

Of the Gauts (a Germanic tribe) — a Germanic name.

The name in its native script.

Jocelyn
Transliteration
Jocelyn
Pronunciation
/ ˈdʒɒs.ə.lɪn /
Root
Grammatical form

Where Jocelyn stands.

Jocelyn does not currently appear in the US Social Security Administration's top 1,000 girls' names, so we don't publish a US rank or birth count for it. That says nothing about the name's standing elsewhere in the world — only that it sits outside the ranked US data we rely on.

Jocelyns before her.

Real people
Jocelyn Bell Burnell
Northern Irish astrophysicist who discovered pulsars.
born 1943
In fiction

Names connected to Jocelyn.

The number behind Jocelyn.

3

The Communicator

In Pythagorean numerology the letters of Jocelyn reduce to 3, The Communicator. This is a traditional interpretive system, not a factual claim about the name.