Popularity of the last name by country

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Origine of last name

KNIGHT : 1: English: status or occupational name from Middle English knight ‘retainer attendant’ (Old English cniht ‘boy youth lad)’. The specialized feudal sense ‘a high-ranking tenant bound to serve his lord as a mounted soldier’ is not known to have ever given rise to the surname although it is not out of the question that it may occasionally have been used as a nickname perhaps for someone who played the part of an armed knight in a local pageant.2: Irish: sometimes adopted for Gaelic Mac an Ridire ‘son of the knight’. See also <a href="https://en.geneanet.org/surnames/McKnight">McKnight</a>.

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