First name meaning: from a Germanic
personal name composed of the elements leo ‘lion’ (a late
addition to the vocabulary of Germanic name elements, taken from
Latin) + hard ‘hardy’, ‘brave’, ‘strong’, which was taken to
England by the Normans. A saint of this name, who is supposed to have
lived in the 6th century, but about whom nothing is known except for a
largely fictional life dating from half a millennium later, was
popular throughout Europe in the early Middle Ages and was regarded as
the patron of peasants and horses.