Motte

• As a French, Walloon, and West Flemish surname, from Old French mot, motte (“embankment, hill, mound”), from Medieval Latin mota (“fortified height”), which could be of Celtic origin and from Gaulish *mutt, *mutta (compare Welsh mwd (“vault, arch, canopy”), Irish móta (“moat”), though this itself could have been borrowed from the English) or otherwise of Germanic origin and from the root of mud. Compare Delamotte, Demotte, Lamotte.
• As an English surname, variant of Mott.
• As a German surname, perhaps from Motten in Bavaria, first attested 837, from the personal name Moto (compare *mōd (“courage, bravery”)).

Motte

1. A surname.

• Wolf-Armin von Reitzenstein: Lexikon fränkischer Ortsnamen. Herkunft und Bedeutung. Oberfranken, Mittelfranken, Unterfranken. C. H. Beck, München 2009, S. 151 (eingeschränkte Vorschau in der Google-Buchsuche).

Borrowed from Middle Low German motte, mutte, from Old Saxon *motta, *motto, from Proto-West Germanic *mottō, *moþþō, perhaps related to *muggju (“mosquito, midge”),^[1] or *maþō (“worm”).^[2]

Cognate with Dutch mot and English moth, which see for more.

• IPA^(key): /ˈmɔtə/

• Audio (Austria):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɔtə

Motte f (genitive Motte, plural Motten)

1. moth, any nocturnal butterfly
2. (specifically) moth, a member of Tineidae
3. (specifically) the clothing moth, Tineola bisselliella

• Falter m
• Tagfalter m
• Nachtfalter m
• Raupe f
• Schmetterling m
• Sommervogel m

• “Motte” in Duden online
• “Motte” in Digitales Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache