A variant of Dashiell, a surname-style name with French place-name roots.
Dashel is most commonly understood as a variant of Dashiell, a name that carries one of American literature's most atmospheric associations: Samuel Dashiell Hammett, the crime novelist who gave the world The Maltese Falcon and Sam Spade. Hammett's middle name, which he made his byline, came from his mother's family — a Scots-French surname of uncertain derivation, possibly from the Flemish de Chiel or a corruption of a Welsh patronymic. Whatever its origins, Dashiell had a hard-boiled, cinematic quality that suited a writer who practically invented the American detective genre.
The -el ending in Dashel softens the name slightly, giving it a feel more at home with contemporary first-name conventions while retaining the distinctive Dash- opening that makes it so vivid. "Dash" itself evokes speed, elegance, and a certain rakish confidence — qualities that have made the prefix popular in fictional characters from Flash Gordon to The Incredibles' own Dash Parr. The name thus operates on two registers: the inherited weight of literary history and the kinetic energy of its sound.
Dashel remains relatively rare, which is part of its appeal for parents drawn to names that feel substantive and well-traveled without being overly familiar. S. naming charts since the 1990s, never crowding the top ranks but quietly accumulating a reputation as a name for a child expected to be, in some way, memorable.