Devin (name)

Baroque oil-portrait. From the waist up: three clothed female figures in profile. She who sits to our left holds a classical lyre, she to our right, an open book of unlined writing paper. These sit shoulder-to-shoulder with the centre figure behind; only her head and neck are visible.
Harpistry, lyricism, and chronicling, all were greatly admired in the Irish poets of old: 18th century Irish painter, Hugh Douglas Hamilton, cast his patroness as the Three Muses in this allegorical oil-portrait.

The male or female name Devin is pronounced DEV-in. It is of Irish and Gaelic origin, and its meaning is most commonly given as 'bard' or 'poet'. The name may also be spelt Devan, Deven, and rarely Devyn. The name Davinia may also be a female variant of Devin, though generally considered a variant of David.

French connotations

The epithet Devyn in Old French carried the meaning of 'divine' (Mod. Fr. divin). It was given to the highest of kings, as a title conveying the sense of a perfect or flawless being. A descendent of the Latin dīvīnus, Old French devin ultimately derives from the name of the Proto-Indo-European god Dyēus (q.v.), followed by the Greco-Latin suffix -īnus: thus a combined meaning of 'godlike' or 'godly'.

In Modern French, devyn refers to a man who divines; a soothsayer (a female soothsayer would be a devineresse). This sense, again, comes from the Latin dīvīnus, while Old French devin (Godly) has shifted to the modern 'd i v i n' spelling. Devyn is also of Indian (Hindu) origin meaning "resembling a God"

People named Devin

See also


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