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Updated June 9, 2019

Family name origins & meanings

  • English and Scottish : from the plural of Middle English oven ‘oven’, ‘furnace’ (for lime, iron, charcoal, etc.), hence a topographic name or occupational name for someone who lived near or worked at an oven or furnace. According to MacLysaght this surname is found also in County Fermanagh in Ireland.
  • North German : patronymic from the Frisian personal name Ove.

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