Hagoth is an interesting Book of Mormon character, who is introduced in Alma 63
And it came to pass that Hagoth, he being an curious man, therefore he went forth and built him an exceedingly large ship, on the borders of the land , by the land Desolation, and launched it forth into the west sea, by the neck which led into the land northward. (Alma 63:5)
He seems to me to be introduced in a typical Jewish manner, where there is a name and then a characteristic explaining the name. In Israel, all names had a meaning and defined characteristics, attributes or major events in the life of the person bearing that name. In this case, "exceedingly curious" is declared his main characteristic after introducing him by name. This follows a common pattern where I would expect the meaning of his name to relate to this characteristic.
The etymology of Book of Mormon names is not always easy since they are an English transliteration of a language that is largely unknown except for the fact that it is related to Hebrew and probably spelled with script similar to Hieratic. But the Book of Mormon Onomasticon page has a good candidate for the name, Hagoth: The Hebrew word, haguth, means "meditation" or "musing". Perhaps we imagine Hagoth as an explorer, in which case we would conclude that this possible Hebrew meaning is not a good fit. But verse 7 in the same chapter indicates otherwise
And in the thirty and eighth year, this man [Hagoth] built ships. And the first ship did also return, and many more people did enter into it; and they also took much provisions, and set out again to the land northward. (Alma 63:7)
Apparently, Hagoth did not sail with his own ship. He stayed behind and built other ships and then the first ship returned. This indicates that he was really curious about what the land northward was like without having the desire to explore it himself, but instead having others go and report back. In that case, his exceeding curiosity is less of the exploratory type and more of the reflective type and makes a good fit with the possible Hebrew equivalent of the English transliterated name. This would be another addition to a long and growing list of Hebrew wordplays in the Book of Mormon.
