Shelby

//ˈʃɛlbi// name

name ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Proper Noun
  1. 1
    A surname from Old English.
  2. 2
    A unisex given name transferred from the surname.; A female given name transferred from the surname.

    "As they walked, Shelby reached down and gently took Alan's hand to hold. They warmly exchanged a smile with each other just before Shelby looked down and Alan blushed. Whenever she was with Alan he made her feel like an innocent girl again."

  3. 3
    A unisex given name transferred from the surname.; A male given name transferred from the surname.
  4. 4
    A placename:; A city, the county seat of Toole County, Montana, United States.
  5. 5
    A placename:; A city, the county seat of Cleveland County, North Carolina, United States.
Show 2 more definitions
  1. 6
    A placename:; A number of townships in the United States, listed under Shelby Township.
  2. 7
    A placename:; Ellipsis of Shelby County. abbreviation, alt-of, ellipsis

Synonyms

All synonyms
shelbi

Example

More examples

"As they walked, Shelby reached down and gently took Alan's hand to hold. They warmly exchanged a smile with each other just before Shelby looked down and Alan blushed. Whenever she was with Alan he made her feel like an innocent girl again."

Etymology

From a medieval name, of obscure origin, yet likely an alteration of Middle English Selby, Salibi (“dweller of the willow place”), from salwe (“willow, sallow”) + -by (“settlement, farm”).

Related phrases

Shelby CountyShelby knotcleveland countycounty seatnorth carolinatoole county

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.