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Kenneth


FieldValue
nameKenneth
imageFile:History-kenneth.jpg
captionKenneth McAlpin
pronunciation
genderMale
meaning'Handsome', 'fire-born'
languageEnglish
shortformKen
related namesCainnech/Coinneach, Cináed

Kenneth is a given name of Gaelic origin. The name is an Anglicised form of two entirely different Gaelic personal names: Cainnech and Cináed. The modern Gaelic form of Cainnech is Coinneach; the name was derived from a byname meaning "handsome", "comely".

Etymology

The second part of the name Cinaed is derived either from the Celtic *aidhu, meaning "fire", or else Brittonic jʉ:ð meaning "lord".

People

  • Cainnech of Aghaboe (515/16–600), Ireland, Saint Canice or Saint Kenneth
  • Saint Cenydd or Welsh Saint Keneth, (a separate individual from above)
  • Kenneth (1927–2013), born Kenneth Battelle, American celebrity hairdresser
  • Kenneth MacAlpin, Kenneth I of Scotland
  • Kenneth II of Scotland
  • Kenneth III of Scotland
  • Kenneth J. Alford (1881–1945), English composer
  • Kenneth Allen (murderer) (born 1942), American murderer
  • Kenneth Allott (1912–1973), Anglo-Irish poet and academic
  • Kenneth Alwyn (1925–2020), English conductor and composer
  • Kenneth Amis (b. 1970), Bermudian tuba player
  • Kenneth Anger (b. 1927), American avant-garde-film director
  • Kenneth Arrow (1921–2017), American economist, Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics winner, 1972
  • Kenneth Atchity (born 1944), American producer, author, columnist, and book reviewer
  • Kenneth Bager (b. 1962), Danish musician and record producer
  • Kenneth Bainbridge (1904–1996), American physicist
  • Kenneth Baker, Baron Baker of Dorking (b. 1934), UK Home Secretary
  • Kenneth Barner, American engineer
  • Kenneth Beard (1927–2010), English Cathedral Organist
  • Kenneth Benton (1909–1999), British MI6 officer and author
  • Kenneth Bianchi (b. 1951), American serial killer, one of the Hillside Stranglers
  • Kenneth Bigley (1942–2004), contractor, beheaded on television in Iraq
  • Kenneth W. Bilby (1918–1997), American recipient of the Legion of Honour, executive vice president of RCA, and author
  • Kenneth Blevins, American drummer and percussionist
  • Sir Kenneth Bloomfield (b. 1931), former Head of the Northern Ireland Civil Service
  • Kenneth E. Boulding (1910–1993), economist
  • Kenneth Box (b. 1930), British track and field sprinter
  • Sir Kenneth Branagh (b. 1960), Irish Shakespearean and film actor
  • Kenneth Bressett (b. 1928), American numismatist
  • Kenneth Bron (Kenny B) (b. 1961), Surinamese-born singer
  • Kenneth Bruffee (1934–2019), Professor emeritus at Brooklyn College
  • Kenneth Burke (1897–1993), American literary theorist and philosopher
  • Kenneth Calman (b. 1941), English chief medical officer
  • Kenneth Carpenter (b. 1949), paleontologist
  • Kenneth G. Caulton, inorganic chemist and professor
  • Kenneth Chenault (b. 1951), former CEO of American Express
  • Kenneth Arnold Chesney (b. 1968), American country singer
  • Kenneth Church (1930–2020), Canadian jockey
  • Kenneth Clark (1903–1983), English art historian
  • Kenneth Clark (psychologist)
  • Kenneth Clarke (b. 1940), Chancellor of the Exchequer
  • Kenneth Cole (b. 1954), American clothing designer
  • Kenneth Colley (b. 1937), English actor
  • Kenneth R. Conklin, activist
  • Kenneth Connor (1918–1993), British comedic actor
  • Kenneth Cope (b. 1931), English actor
  • Kenneth Cope (musician) (b. 1961), Mormon music composer
  • Kenneth Darling (1909–1998), British general
  • Kenneth C. Davis, American historian, author
  • Kenneth Dougall (b. 1993), Australian football player
  • Kenneth Dover (1920–2010), British academic
  • Kenneth "K. K." Downing (b. 1951), guitarist
  • Kenneth J. Dunkley (b. 1939), American inventor
  • Kenneth Easterday (1973–2016), American man born with the rare disability, sacral agenesis
  • Kenneth Edmonds ("Babyface") (b. 1959), American R&B singer
  • Kenneth Erskine (b. 1963), serial killer
  • Kenneth H. Fake (1895–1963), American politician
  • Kenneth Farrow (American football) (b. 1993), American football player
  • Kenneth Fearing (1902–1961), American poet
  • Kenneth Feinberg (b. 1945), American attorney
  • Kenneth Ford (disambiguation), several people
  • Kenneth Frampton (b. 1930), British architect and architecture critic
  • Kenneth Gainwell (b. 1999), American football player
  • John Kenneth Galbraith (1908–2006), Canadian-American economist
  • Kenneth Gamble (b. 1943), songwriter and producer
  • Kenneth Gasana (b. 1984), Rwandan basketball player
  • Kenneth J. Gergen (b. 1935), American psychologist
  • Kenneth R. Giddens (1908–1993), broadcaster
  • Kenneth Gittens (born 1971), Virgin Islands politician
  • Kenneth Gorelick (Kenny G) (b. 1956), smooth jazz professional saxophonist
  • Kenneth Grahame (1859–1932), British author
  • Kenneth C. Griffin (b. 1968), American entrepreneur and billionaire
  • Kenneth E. Hagin (1917–2003), Pentecostal minister
  • Kenneth L. Hale (1934–2001, American linguist
  • Kenneth Halliwell (1926–1967), British actor, lover and murderer of Joe Orton
  • Kenneth Ham (b. 1954), American astronaut
  • Kenneth "Ken" Holtzman (b. 1945), American Major League Baseball pitcher
  • Kenneth "Ken" Hon, American geologist and head of Hawaiian Volcano Observatory.
  • Kenneth Horne (1907–1969), English actor and comedian
  • Kenneth Gardner Hughes (b. 1954), Canadian politician
  • Kenneth Hutchings (1882–1916), English amateur cricketer
  • Kenneth Irons, comic book character in Witchblade
  • Kenneth E. Iverson (1920–2004), Canadian computer scientist, developed the APL programming language
  • Kenneth Jamieson, American politician
  • Kenneth V. Jones (1924–2020), British composer
  • Kenneth Katzner (1930–2003), American linguist
  • Kenneth Kaunda (1924–2021), first President of Zambia
  • Kenneth Keating (1900–1975), US Senator
  • Kenneth Kedi (b. 1971), Marshallese politician
  • Kenneth Kendall (1924–2012), British newsreader
  • Kenneth Keith Kelley (1901–1991), American chemist
  • Kenneth Kennedy (speed skater) (1913–1985), Australian Winter Olympian
  • Jonathan King (b. 1944), born Kenneth George King, pop music mogul
  • Kenneth Kitchen (b. 1932), British historian, Egyptologist
  • Kenneth Klassen (b. 1951), Canadian sex tourist
  • Kenneth Koch (1925–2002), American poet
  • Kenneth Kraus (b. 1956), former United States Marine
  • Kenneth Law (born 1965), Canadian man who was charged with shipping sodium nitrite
  • Kenneth Lawson (b. 1963), law professor and former lawyer
  • Kenneth Lay (1942–2006), American businessman, former CEO of Enron
  • Kenneth Little (1908–1991), English academic
  • Kenneth Livingstone (b. 1945), English politician
  • Kenneth Ma (b. 1974), Hong Kong actor
  • Kenneth Mackintosh (1875–1957), justice of the Washington Supreme Court
  • Kenneth McDavid, American murder victim
  • Kenneth McDuff (1946–1998), American serial killer
  • Kenneth McKellar (1869–1957), American politician
  • Kenneth McKellar (1927–2010), Scottish singer
  • Kenneth Meers (1960–1992), American murder victim
  • Kenneth Barbour Montgomery (1897–1965), English World War I flying ace
  • Kenneth More (1914–1982), English actor (Genevieve, Reach for the Sky)
  • Kenneth Murdock (born 1963), Canadian truck driver who was a hitman for the Musitano crime family of Hamilton, Ontario
  • Kenneth Murray (disambiguation), multiple people
  • Kenneth O'Keefe (b. 1969), American-Irish-Palestinian activist
  • Kenneth Roderick O'Neal (1908–1989), African-American architect
  • Kenneth Odumegwu (born 2000), Nigerian-American football player
  • Kenneth A. Oye (b. 1949), Associate Professor of Political Science and Engineering Systems, MIT
  • Kenneth Parnell (1931–2008), American convicted sex offender, child rapist, and kidnapper
  • Kenneth Paschal (born 1966), American politician
  • Kenneth Perez (b. 1974), Danish footballer
  • Kenneth Lee Pike (1912–2000), American linguist and anthropologist
  • Kenneth Platts (1946–1989), British composer
  • Kenneth Ramchand (b. 1939), Trinidad and Tobago academic and writer
  • Kenneth Rexroth (1905–1982), American poet
  • Kenneth Robinson (British politician) (1911–1996), British politician and broadcaster
  • Kenneth Rose (1924–2014), royal biographer
  • Kenneth Ross, Scottish-American screenwriter of the films The Day of the Jackal, The Odessa File, etc.
  • Kenneth G. Ross (b. 1941), Australian playwright, and screenwriter of the film Breaker Morant
  • Kenneth Schellenberger (b. 1948), Canadian politician
  • Kenneth Searight (1883–1957), British writer and linguist
  • Kenneth Shaw ("Buzz" Shaw) (b. 1939), American academic, college chancellor
  • Kenneth Slessor (1901–1971), Australian poet
  • Kenneth Starr (b. 1946), American lawyer, special investigator of U.S. President Bill Clinton
  • Kenneth M. Taylor (1919–2006), American WWII pilot
  • Kenneth Thomson, 2nd Baron Thomson of Fleet (1923–2006), Canadian businessman, billionaire
  • Kenneth Tigar (b. 1942), American actor
  • Kenneth Tolon II (b. 1981), college football player
  • Kenneth Tynan (1927–1980), English theatre critic and writer
  • Kenneth Vance, American politician
  • Kenneth N. Waltz (1924–2013), American political scientist
  • Kenneth Warren (1926–2019), British Conservative Party politician
  • Kenneth Welsh (1942–2022), Canadian actor
  • Kenneth Williams (1926–1988), English comedian and actor
  • Kenneth G. Wilson (1936–2013), American theoretical physicist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics, 1982

Fictional characters

  • Kenneth Widmerpool, in Anthony Powell's novel sequence A Dance to the Music of Time
  • Kenneth Parcell, in the sitcom 30 Rock

References

References

  1. (2006). "A dictionary of first names". [[Oxford University Press]].
  2. Busse, Peter E.. (2006). "Celtic culture: a historical encyclopedia". [[ABC-CLIO]].
  3. "Approaching the Pictish language: historiography, early evidence and the question of Pritenic".
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