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Updated June 9, 2019

Family name origins & meanings

  • French : topographic name for someone who lived near an irrigation channel, from Old French chenal ‘channel’, ‘pipe’ (Late Latin canalis, a derivative of canna ‘reed’).
  • A Chenault from St. Malo, France is documented in Ste-Foy, Quebec, in 1731, with the variant Chauveau.

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