Family name origins & meanings
- North German : from Middle Low German klūt(e) ‘lump of earth’, ‘sod’, ‘clod’, hence nicknames for an ungainly, clumsy, or uncouth person; in some cases they may have been applied as a metonymic occupational name for a farmer. See also Kloth, Klotz.
- North German : habitational name from, for example, places called Klut near Hamelin or Detmold.
- Probably also a variant of Dutch Kloot(e) or Kloet, cognates of 1, from Middle Dutch cloot ‘clog’, ‘clod’, ‘lump’.