Catherine Family History

French, English, and Scottish: from the female personal name Catherine (Old French and Middle English Katerine) from Latin Caterina from Greek Aikaterinē which is of uncertain origin. The usual vernacular form in medieval England was Cateline; see Catlin.

The personal name was very popular in the Middle Ages due to Saint Katherine of Alexandria, a legendary Christian figure of doubtful historicity who was supposedly martyred under the Emperor Maxentius in 307.

The modern spelling and pronunciation of the name with -th- is a 16th-century ‘learned’ introduction by clerics and other educated people who believed that it derived from Greek katharos ‘pure’.