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Updated June 9, 2019

Family name origins & meanings

  • English : metonymic occupational name for a cooper or else a nickname for a rotund, fat man, from Middle English, Old French busse ‘cask’, ‘barrel’ (of unknown origin). The word was also used in Middle English for a type of ship, and the surname may perhaps have been given to someone who sailed in one. The byname seems to occur already in Domesday Book, where a Siward Buss, and a John and Richard Buss are recorded at Brasted in Kent.
  • German and Swiss German : from a pet form of the personal name Burkhard (see Burkhart).
  • Danish : variant of Buus.

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