Origin and popularity of the name JOHNSON

Origin

Johnson : 1: English and Scottish: patronymic from the Middle English and Older Scots personal name Johan Jo(h)n (see John) + -son. It was often interchanged with Jenson and Janson. In North America this surname has absorbed cognates from other languages e.g. Norwegian Danish or North German Johnsen Johannesen Johannsen Johansen Jansen Jantzen and Jensen Swedish Johnsson (see below) Johansson Jonsson and Jansson Dutch Janssen German Janz Czech Jansa 1 and Slovenian Janša (see Jansa 2) and Janežič (see Janezic). Johnson (including in the sense 2 below) is the second most frequent surname in the US. It is also the second most common surname among Native Americans and a very common surname among African Americans.2: Americanized form (and a less common Swedish variant) of Swedish Johnsson: patronymic from the personal name John a variant of Jon (see John). Compare 1 above.

Johnston : 1: Scottish: habitational name deriving in most cases from the place so called in Annandale in Dumfriesshire. This is derived from the genitive case of the personal name John + + Middle English ton ‘town village settlement’ (Old English tūn). There are other places in Scotland so called including the city of Perth which used to be known as Saint John's Toun and some of these may also be sources of the surname.2: English: habitational name from Johnson Hall (Staffordshire) recorded as Johanneston c. 1233 and Joneston in 1314. The placename means ‘John's settlement’ from the genitive case of the Middle English personal name Johan Jon (see John) + Middle English ton ‘town village settlement’.

Tilby : possibly a variant of Tailby which derives from Tealby (Lincs) but this place-name usually appears in forms like Tevelby and Teleby in the medieval period and seems unlikely to have given rise to the early Tilby spellings cited below. A reference to Michael Johnson of London sawyer born at Tylby in the parts of Brabant 1436 in Patent Rolls suggests that the name may be an English rendering of Tilburg.

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Last name frequency

Geographic distribution of the 685,449 individuals with the name JOHNSON on Geneanet.

This last name in the family trees

See below the Geneanet members' family trees which contain the last name JOHNSON