English, Dutch, German and Hebrew; from Greek personal name Alexandros, meaning "defender" or "helper"; NT: Mark 15:21.
A full list of national variations has been added to Wikipedia [see http://tinyurl.com/WIAN0004 for details]
The choice of abbreviation in official documents appears to be somewhat idiosyncratic. Alexr (usually shown as Alexr) is one of the most favoured, occurring as frequently in the 1841 Census of Aberdeenshire as the full name, but several others occur. A search on Alex* should find most variants and abbreviations although Alx and Alxr also occur significantly often. We have noted that Alexr has occasionally been transcribed as Alexa and vice versa.
The spelling Allexander has been found in some older Scottish records. |