Collins

The Irish line of Ó Coileáin traces to a ruling family of the Ui Chonaill Gabhra in County Limerick, displaced during the Norman conquest of Ireland in the 12th century and resettled in West Cork, where Collins remains 1 of the most common surnames.

The English line spread through the medieval guild records of London and southern counties, with parish registers showing widespread use by the 15th century.

Notable historical bearers include the English philosopher Anthony Collins (1676-1729), a friend of John Locke and a leading figure of the early Enlightenment; the novelist Wilkie Collins (1824-1889), author of The Woman in White (1860) and The

Moonstone (1868), often credited as a founder of the detective novel; and the Irish revolutionary Michael Collins (1890-1922), a key figure in the Irish War of Independence.

The American poet Billy Collins, born in 1941, served as Poet Laureate of the United States from 2001 to 2003.

The transition from surname to feminine given name is a distinctly 21st-century American phenomenon. According to U.S.

Social Security Administration records, Collins first entered the top 1000 for girls in 2010 and climbed quickly, breaking into the top 300 by the early 2020s.

Its rise parallels that of other preppy-sounding surname-names such as Emerson, Kennedy, and Campbell. The name is used almost exclusively for girls in the United States, though it remains primarily a surname in Ireland and the United Kingdom.