Doty Surname

Doty Origin & Meaning

The surname Doty has deep Anglo-Saxon roots, perhaps originating in the County of Suffolk in England before the Norman Conquest in 1066. It is thought to have been a nickname for a man who was regarded as strong and brave, derived from the Old english word doughty or dohti.

Doty Spelling Variants

Only in the past few centuries has spelling become standardized in the English language. Even more recently, vowels have been used loosely. As a result, the surname Doty has many spelling variants – sometimes within a single family.

Besides the familiar Doty, Doten, and Doughty, here are some other spelling variant that researchers have discovered:

 

 

Doety	Dotty	Doughton	Dowghtie
Dotchen	Dotyn	Doutee	Dowghty
Dotey	Doubte	Doutty	Dowtie
Dotte	Doughtey	Douty	Dowty
Dottin	Doughtie	Dowbte

 

For simplicity, on this Website, when we use Doty, we intend to include all of its spelling variants.

 

 

Doty Lineages in America

Not everyone in America who has the surname Doty is a descendant of Edward Doty, the Mayflower passenger. There are several, separate Doty lineages, of which Edward’s was only one.

Although the Pilgrim Edward Doty Society is dedicated to Edward Doty, it also hosts the family tree of Reverend Francis Doughty (1616-ca. 1670), a prominent early Colonist who is not known to have been related to Edward. The purpose of this is to help researchers untangle these separate lineages.

Ethan Allen Doty (1838-1915) – a descendant of Edward Doty, an accomplished genealogist in his day, and the compiler of the Doty-Doten Family in America (1897) – also published an article entitled “The Doughty Family of Long Island” (1912). This article details the early lineage of Reverend Doughty.