From Irish Gaelic "Conán" meaning "little wolf" or "little hound."
Conan emerges from the ancient Gaelic conn, a word of layered meaning encompassing 'hound,' 'chief,' and 'wisdom' or 'sense.' It was a name of high status in early Irish culture, borne by warriors and kings: Saint Conan was a 7th-century Bishop of the Isle of Man, and Conan of Brittany was an important figure in the early medieval Atlantic world. In Irish mythology Conan Maol ('the Bald') was a boisterous, sometimes buffoonish but fiercely courageous member of the Fianna, the legendary warrior band of Fionn mac Cumhaill — a figure who added comic texture to the heroic cycle.
The name found its most globally famous modern champion through Arthur Conan Doyle, the Scottish physician who created Sherlock Holmes and took Conan as a middle name in honor of his godfather, the Irish novelist Michael Conan. His fame ensured that 'Conan' carried a literary, intellectual association even as Robert E. Howard's 1932 creation Conan the Barbarian — the Cimmerian sword-and-sorcery hero — pushed the name toward a very different kind of archetypal power: raw physical strength, stoic endurance, and an uncompromising code.
Both versions of Conan — cerebral and warrior — exist in the name simultaneously. Late-night television host Conan O'Brien gave the name a third dimension in the 1990s and beyond: self-deprecating wit, high intelligence, and an endearingly gangly presence. In Ireland the name has never faded; internationally it carries a pleasingly robust, distinctive sound that marks it as Celtic without being opaque to English speakers.