Probably it traces back to proto-Dravidian.

That sounds pretty sinister.

Ancestry.com, which does not cite its sources, claims that the surname Kitto is derived from the same as a given name, the Cornish equivalent of Gruffudd; another source says Kitto as a first name is a hypocoristic form of Christopher.

I think it's interesting that Kitto was named after Humphrey Davy, another and more famous Cornishman.

How about Hatto? - there used to be a German professor of that name in London.

I don’t know if it’s relevant, but it reminds me of the Welsh name Guto (pronounced ‘gitto,’ as in the legendary runner Guto Nyth Bran) which apparently is a diminutive form of Gruffudd (Griffith).

In one of the fantasy series I read, there's a character named Kitto who is a descendant of Cornish fairies.

If it is Cornish, then it's not Gaelic, of course. P-Celtic vs. Q-Celtic.

I've never come across anyone Irish with the name, and the phone book doesn't list anyone with that surname in Dublin, where a quarter of the population of the Republic lives.

a href="http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07149c.htm">Hatto, Swabian archbishop, ca 850 A.D.

Joyce Hatto, pianist of recent times, known for being unknown

Try again with additional information:

Hatto, Swabian archbishop, ca. 850 A.D., who was not really eaten by rats even though people keep saying that.

'Mancini' is an Italian word meaning literally 'left-handed men' (masculine plural), and it's a very widespread surname in Italy. As a surname it may mean something like: son of a left-handed man. Italian surnames ending by '-i' mean 'son of', like English '-son' or Scottish 'Mac'. Supposedly, 'Pelosi' means son/daughter of a hairy man.

So that would be Nancy Ben Esau: My Brother Esau Is An Hairy Man, But I, I am a Smooth Man".

Also of possible relevance would be the 17th-century Highland warrior Alasdair Cholla Chiataich Mac Dhòmhnaill (i.e., Alasdair "son of left-handed Coll" MacDonald), whose Gaelic name was anglicized to "Colkitto".

I had the idea that Kitto is a Cornish name, although I don't know where from... it doesn't conform to the usual heuristic "by Tre, Pol and Pen shall ye know all Cornishmen".

As for Hatto, googling suggests it is not Cornish but German. That /h/ should have given it away I suppose.

I would have bet 5 dollars on Finnish.

The late Joyce Hatto became the subject of scandal this week:

The world of classical music has been thrown into turmoil after audio experts denounced a series of critically acclaimed recordings by a revered English pianist as fakes.

Joyce Hatto, who died last year aged 77, had not given a recital in decades because she was suffering from cancer and thought it "impolite to look ill" in public.

iTunes allegedly identified her discs as being exactly the same as others produced by different pianists.

see more at:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/02/17/npianist17.xml

There's actually a website called Cornish Surnames. Kitto seems to be a fairly common Cornish name, and the idea that it's a patronymic (son of Kit, or Christopher - with the 'o' being appended instead of preposed as in Irish Ó Brian, Ó Connor etc.) seems widespread.

Interestingly, a meaningless piece of trivia (and some food for the dravidian connection):

'Kitto' is Basque for 'nuff said! (as in an old campaig promoting the use of this language: 'Euskaraz eta kitto!' - (In) Basque is enough).

Thanks for the info. I had forgotten Bishop Hatto. And I read about the Joyce Hatto scandal before I came back here. A wonderful story!
I suppose Bishop Hatto won't have come from Cornwall...

I lifted the following from a Kitto family site:
The Kitto name is strictly Cornish, of Celtic Blue Blood origin, dating back to 0 A.D. They were the original pioneers of Southern England, Cornwall and Devonshire. The Saxons entered England from the East in 500 A.D. It may be noted here that following a Civil War in 1440 the Celts went off in five directions. A branch went to Scotland and became the Scottish people; a branch to Ireland, a branch to Wales, a branch to the Isle of Man, a branch to Devonshire, and those that stayed became Cornish, that's us!
http://www.kitto.cc/histories.htm

The map at http://www.spatial-literacy.org/UCLnames/Surnames.aspx shows that in 1881 Kitto was an almost exclusively Cornish name, although by 1998 there were a number of pockets through England, with even a few in Scotland and Wales. No connection with Hatto, which seems to have originated as a surname around Oxford.

The tragic Hatto clan: a millenium of fraud -- and more. The false claim to have been eaten by rats, The fake CDs. Will Arthur's reputation survive these revelations?

The full saying is

"By Ros, Car, Lan,
Tre, Pol, and Pen
you shall know
most Cornish men"

Interestingly, those are all eponyms, not patronyms, as most Celtic names are. Kitto is a patronym.

Tre = Homestead/Village, Pol = Pool, Pen = Head, Ros = Heath, Car = Camp, Lan = Churchyard - and if you know Welsh you can see the similarities, tre = tref, pol = pwll, lan = llan, pen = pen, and ros = rhos, while car = gwer- I imagine.

But few Welsh surnames are eponyms, while many (most?) Cornish ones are. Interesting difference.

Interestingly, 'manchot' means "one-handed" in French. I bet they're connected. (With Mancini I mean, not Kitto!)

I suppose both derive from 'mancare'.

If Le Pen is the Brain, who is Pinky?

*shudder*