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Updated June 9, 2019

Family name origins & meanings

  • South German : variant of Kercher (see Karcher), but also from the dialect word Kerker ‘prison’ (Latin carcer), hence a metonymic occupational name for a prison warder or possibly a topographic name.
  • North German : topographic name for someone who lived near a church, from Low German kerke ‘church’, or possibly an occupational name from a reduced form of Low German Kerkener ‘sexton’.
  • Sorbian topographic name for someone living near bushes, from Sorbian kerk ‘bush’, ‘undergrowth’.
  • Dutch : topographic name for someone who lived by a dungeon, Dutch kerker.

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