Huxley is an English surname taken from a place in Cheshire; the name is usually explained as "Hucc's clearing" or "Hugh's meadow", from an Old English personal name and leah, a woodland clearing. The author Aldous Huxley, who wrote Brave New World, gave the surname its intellectual ring. As a first name Huxley is new: it entered the US top 1000 in 2015, peaked at number 538 in 2020 and ranks number 736 in 2025.