Family name origins & meanings
- English : occupational name for an innkeeper, from Middle English, Old French (h)oste ‘host’, ‘guest’.
- Danish (Høst) : nickname from høst ‘harvest’, ‘autumn’ (see Herbst).
- French : from Old French ost ‘army’, hence an occupational name for a soldier.
- Dutch : from the Germanic personal name Austa, meaning ‘east’.
- German : habitational name from either of two places called Host, near Koblenz and near Bitburg.