Family name origins & meanings
- German and Jewish (Ashkenazic) : occupational name for a builder of walls of stone or brick, from an agent derivative of Middle High German mūre, German Mauer ‘wall’ (from Latin murus ‘wall’, especially a city wall). In the Middle Ages the majority of dwellings were built of wood (or lath and plaster), and this term would have specifically denoted someone employed in building defensive walls, castles, churches, and other public buildings.