Variant of Randall, from Germanic 'rand' (shield rim) and 'wulf' (wolf), meaning 'shield wolf.'
Randell is a variant of Randall, itself derived from the medieval given name Randolph, which traces to the Old German *Randwulf* — a compound of *rand* (shield rim, edge) and *wulf* (wolf). The shield-wolf is a vivid kenning for a warrior: one who defends with the ferocity of a wolf and the steadiness of a shield-bearer. Such compound martial names were the currency of Norse and Germanic naming culture, where a child's name was understood as a statement of aspiration and tribal identity.
When the Normans carried these names into England after 1066, Randolph and its diminutives Rand, Randy, and Randall took root in English soil. In the medieval English record, Randolph appears frequently among the Norman nobility, and by the high medieval period it had filtered down into common usage. The Earl of Chester was often named Ranulf or Randolph, making the name associated with the powerful Palatine of Chester.
In American history, John Randolph of Roanoke — the brilliant, eccentric Virginia congressman and orator — gave the name a distinctly Southern aristocratic flavor that persisted into the nineteenth century. The spelling Randell, with its doubled final consonant, is most commonly found in the American South and among African American families, where the variant gained traction in the mid-twentieth century as an expression of individuality within a familiar name tradition. It has the feel of a name that has been lived in — softened slightly from the sharp Anglo-Saxon original, domesticated by generations of porch-sitting and Sunday dinners, without losing the quiet assurance of its wolfish, shield-bearing ancestry.