Origin and popularity of the name SOUND

Origin

Sound : 1: from Middle English sound sund ‘sound healthy prosperous’ (Old English sund) for a healthy or prosperous person. 2: from Middle English sound sund ‘sound (body of water sea)’ (Old English sund) for someone who lived by a sound or strait.variant of Sand.

Bell : 1: English (northern) and Scottish (Lowlands): from the Middle English personal name Bell. As a man's name this is from Old French beu bel ‘handsome’ which was also used as a nickname. As a female name it represents a short form of Isabel.2: English (northern) and Scottish (Lowlands): from Middle English belle ‘bell’ (Old English belle) in various applications; most probably a metonymic occupational name for a bell ringer or bell maker or a topographic name for someone living ‘at the bell’ (as attested by 14th-century forms such as John atte Belle). This indicates either residence by an actual bell (e.g. a town's bell in a bell tower centrally placed to summon meetings sound the alarm etc.) or ‘at the sign of the bell’ i.e. a house or inn sign (although surnames derived from house and inn signs are rare in Scots and English).3: English: from Middle English bel ‘fair fine good’ (Old French bel ‘beautiful fair’). See also Beal 1.4: German: from Bell in Rhineland or possibly from Belle in Westphalia.5: Norwegian: habitational name from a farmstead in western Norway named Bell the origin of which is unexplained.6: Scandinavian: of English or German origin (see above).7: Americanized form of German Böhl or Böll (see Boehle Boll).8: American shortened and altered form of various Slavic names beginning with Bel- ‘white’ e.g. of Rusyn (from Slovakia) Belejčák a derivative of Belej (see Beley 3).9: Americanized form of one or more similar (like-sounding) Jewish surnames.

Birtles : 1: from Birtles (in Prestbury Cheshire) Birchill Farm (in Hassop Derbys) or possibly Birchills (in Walsall Staffs). The place-names are from the plural of Old English *bircel ‘small birch’ with occasional confusion of the final syllable with Middle English hill hull ‘hill’ and hale ‘corner of land’ (etc.). Pronunciation of /ʧ/ in Birch- has been simplified to /t/ before the following /l/ whence modern Birtles but the -th- spellings in the medieval forms are probably misreadings of -ch-; the letters c and t are commonly indistinguishable in medieval court hand.post-medieval variant of Birtle with excrescent -s. 2: perhaps a post-medieval variant of Birchall + excrescent -s and the sound change from /ʧ/ to /t/ noted in (1) above but Birchall itself could be a variant of Birtles in which case the following bearers belong at (1).

Cardall : 1: perhaps a variant of Caldwell via Cardwell (1). Some of the Staffs and Warwicks examples may derive from (2). 2: alternatively Cardall in Staffs Warwicks and Gloucs may be a variant of the now extinct Kyrdall (-ell -oll) and Kerdall (-oll) later spelled Curdle. Compare the spelling variation in the Gloucs examples and compare Thomas Cardall 1746 with William Curdall 1808 in IGI (Bilston Staffs) and John Cardall 1815 with William Curdle 1847 in IGI (Saint Philip's Birmingham). The etymology of this name is unknown but the variation in spelling points to an original Middle English word or name beginning in Kird- or Kerd- the latter giving rise to Card- (as in Clerk and Clark). Formally it could be a variant of the Somerset name Criddle with metathesis of -r- but there is insufficient evidence to test the hypothesis. 3: in Devon and Cornwall the name is perhaps from Cardwell in Milton Abbot (Devon). With loss of -w- Middle English Kerdewell would have developed to Kerdell and Cardell the former pronunciation giving rise to a pronunciation rhyming with the word curdle probably during the 17th century.the name is nevertheless difficult to disentangle from possible variants of other names such as those in (1) and (2) above which may have migrated to SW England from the W Midlands or further north. There is also potential for confusion between names that sound only partly alike. According to the IGI in 18th- and 19th-century Stoke Damerel Devon Cardell co-existed with Cadwell Colwell and Caudle and in 18th-century Camborne Cornwall it coincided with Cadwell and Cordwell.

Cemal : from the Turkish form of the Arabic personal name Jamal; the letter c in Turkish represents the sound /dʒ/.

Dendy : English (Sussex and Surrey): perhaps a variant of Dandy though the sound change is not regular. Alternatively the name may be a variant of Denny with an intrusive -d-.

Farris : 1: Scottish and Irish: variant of Fergus in which the Gaelic gh sound has been dropped rather than being altered to g. Compare Farrish Ferris.2: Probably also English: variant of Farrar. The name is quite common in southeastern England.

Field : 1: English and Irish: habitational name probably from Field in Leigh Staffordshire. The placename derives from Old English feld ‘flat open country’. In the late 12th century one of Henry II's warrior knights took the surname to Ireland where it often took the semi-Norman French form de la Feld. From the 15th century onward it was increasingly reduced to Field and gave its name to Fieldstown the family's chief seat near Dublin. A branch of the Anglo-Irish family that migrated back to England in the 14th century retained the Normanized form as Delafield.2: English: topographic name for someone who lived by an arable field or an area of open country (Middle English feld).3: Irish: Anglicized form of Feeley through similarity of sound and of Maghery by translation (chiefly in Armagh) from Gaelic An Mhachaire ‘of the field’.4: Americanized form (translation into English) of German and Jewish (Ashkenazic) Feld. The surname of Jewish and German origin is also found in Britain.

Garthe : 1: German: habitational name from a place so named near Cloppenburg.2: German: variant of Garth.3: Norwegian: habitational name from a farm so named most likely derived from garta ‘to grunt’ referring to the sound of a stream or river.

Gooch : 1: English (East Anglia): from the rare Middle English personal name Goche (also found as Joche). It was current in East Anglia from the early 12th to the early 13th centuries as a variant of Anglo-Norman French Go(s)ce Jo(s)ce a pet form of Old French Goscelin.2: English: alternatively a nickname from Anglo-Norman French gouge (from Latin gobio) the nominative form of Old French goujon (from Latin gobionem) ‘gudgeon’ perhaps for a gullible person.3: Welsh: in southwestern England possibly an Anglicized form of Welsh coch goch ‘red(-haired)’ though the sound change is irregular. Compare Gough. It may also be a variant of Cornish and Welsh Couch with the same meaning.4: Americanized form of German Gutsch.

Hepting : South German: presumably a habitational name from a place called Ewatingen formerly Ebding but the aspiration of the initial sound (Hebding) did not occur until 1602. Compare Epting.

Hipsher : Jewish (Ashkenazic): artificial name from an inflected form of German hübsch ‘handsome nice’. The first syllable has been influenced in sound by the Yiddish word hipsh ‘considerable sizeable’.

Jelbert : see Gilbert. John Gylbert of Gulval (Cornwall) in 1524 may be the same man as John Jelbert in the same parish in 1545 (Cornwall Subsidies). This variation in pronunciation of the initial consonant of the surname is mostly found in Cornwall but is French in origin. It reflects a dialectal distinction between Normans who came from northern Normandy where /g/ prevailed until the 13th century and Normans and Frenchmen from southern Normandy and central France where /g/ had long since been palatalized to /dʒ/ a sound often spelled J- in England. For the same variation compare Giffard and Jefford.

Kildare : possibly a reduced form of McElderry from Mac Giolla Dorcha assimilated in sound to the place-name Kildare (Cill Dara).

Kim : 1: Korean: written 김 in Chinese characters 金 meaning ‘gold’. This is the only Chinese character for the surname Kim which is the most common Korean surname comprising about 20 percent of the Korean population. According to some sources there are over 600 different Kim clans but only c. 100 have been documented. Kims can be found in virtually every part of Korea. The two largest Kim clans the Kim family of Kimhae and the Kim family of Kyŏngju are descended from semi-mythological characters who lived two thousand years ago. According to legend the Kimhae Kim family founder Kim Suro came in answer to a prayer offered by the nine elders of the ancient Karak Kingdom. In 42 AD these elders met together to pray for a king. In answer to their prayer they were sent a golden box containing six golden eggs. From the first egg emerged King Su-ro Karak's first king. The other five eggs became the five kings of Karak's neighboring kingdom Kaya. The founder of the Kim family of Kyŏngju Kim Al-ji had similar origins. In 65 AD the king of Shilla T’alhae heard a strange sound from a forest near the Shilla capital Kyŏngju. On investigation he found a crowing white rooster standing next to a golden egg. From this egg emerged Al-ji founder of the Kyŏngju Kim family and subsequent king of the Shilla Kingdom. Because Al-ji emerged from a golden egg King T’alhae bestowed upon the child the surname Kim which means ‘gold’. It is estimated that about half of the one hundred or so Kim clans of modern Korea are descended from the Kyŏngju Kim clan.2: Chinese: Teochew Hokkien and Taiwanese form of the surname 金 meaning ‘gold’ see Jin 1. This surname is found mainly in other parts of Southeast Asia to which Chinese people migrated from Taiwan Fujian province and eastern Guangdong province.3: Chinese: possibly from Romanization of Chinese names such as 金 (meaning ‘gold’) or 锦 (meaning ‘bright and beautiful’) which were monosyllabic personal names or part of disyllabic personal names of some early Chinese immigrants in the US.4: Vietnamese: from the Chinese surname 金 see Jin 1.5: Swiss German: unexplained.

Kingett : from an unrecorded Middle English personal name Kingot or Kinget probably a pet form of the personal name King. Compare the double diminutive William Kyngelot 1328 in Archaeologia Cantiana 33. The surname appears to have developed alternative pronunciations in which /ng/ and /ŋg/ were assibilated to /nʤ/ or /ŋʤ/ in spellings like Kingjett and perhaps Kinggett and Kingeet to /nʧ/ in Kinchet(t) and to /ŋʃ/ in Kinshet Kingshot and Kingsholt leading to /ns/ in Kinsett and to /nz/ in Kinzet. In Kinget(t) the -g- could represent either /g/ or /ʤ/.The assibilation mentioned in (i) is not a regular sound change and may have arisen by confusion of Kingett with Kinzett as a variant of Kensett. Some of the sequences of early bearers below could therefore belong with Kensett including examples of Kingett Kinchet Kinshet and so on although the medieval evidence points more strongly to the explanation in (i).

Klenk : South German:: 1: nickname from Middle High German glenke ‘nimble alert’.2: from Middle High German klenken ‘to cause something to sound or ring’ hence a nickname for a gossip.

Knivett : perhaps as Reaney suggests a variant of Knight but this is far from proven. He attributes it to Norman difficulty in pronouncing the -h- in Old and Middle English cniht. This sound increasingly caused problems for native English speakers and was sometimes altered to [f] as early as the 13th century. This would account for Walter le Knift 1279 in Hundred Rolls (Oxon) but whether this is the source of Cnivet (11th century) and Knivet (13th and 14th centuries) with the intrusive -e- and voicing of [f] to [v] is quite uncertain. There is no evidence for knivet as a variant of knight in MED.perhaps from Middle English knivet knevet a diminutive form of knif ‘knife’ though the name is recorded much earlier than the word (15th-century in MED).

Kracke : German:: 1: variant of Krack.2: nickname for a weak or frail person from Low German kracke ‘old bad horse.’ The word krack is onomatopoeic in that it reflects a cracking or creaking sound.

McColville : see Colville a surname probably adopted from similarity of sound to anglicize Mac Cathmhaoil compare Caulfield.

McMurrough : Irish:: 1: Anglicized form (in Leinster) of Mac Murchadha ‘son of Murchadh’ a personal name meaning ‘sea warrior’. The spelling gh indicates the original guttural fricative sound of the internal -ch-. Elsewhere in Roscommon and Tyrone the usual Anglicized form was Murphy (the same phonetic change as in English laugh cough etc.). Diarmait Mac Murchadha (Dermot McMurrough) was intermittently king of Leinster from 1126–71. After being deposed in 1166 he requested help from Henry II to reclaim his kingdom which resulted in the Norman invasion of Ireland in 1169 under the leadership of Richard de Clare Earl of Pembroke (known as ‘Strongbow’) an event that brought many Anglo-Norman surnames to Ireland. A powerful Irish family of this lineage were also known as Kavanagh after Dermot's son.2: Anglicized form (in Leinster) of Mac Murchadha ‘son of Murchadh’ a personal name meaning ‘sea warrior’. A powerful family of this name were also known as Kavanagh. The spelling gh indicates the original guttural fricative sound of the internal -ch-. Elsewhere (especially in Roscommon and Tyrone) the usual Anglicized form of the Irish name was Murphy.

Menzies : Scottish: variant of Manners in which the z was originally the Middle English letter ʒ (yogh) representing a sound similar to modern English y. The surname is pronounced Meenyus or Minyas in Scotland. The name was brought to Scotland in the 12th or 13th century by a family of Norman knights. It appears that the name was re-interpreted in Gaelic as containing a personal name and for variants ending -s there is a possibility of confusion with McManus. See also McMinn.

O'Garro : perhaps an anglicized form of Ó Gadhra see O'Gara. While this name is similar in sound to Scottish Gaelic Garrow the presence of O' in the anglicized form makes this an unlikely origin.

Oren : 1: Jewish (Israeli): artificial name from Hebrew oren ‘pine tree’. In some cases it may be a substitute for some original Ashkenazic surname of similar sound or meaning e.g. Tannenbaum or Sosna.2: Norwegian (Øren): habitational name from any of about thirty farmsteads mainly on the west coast of Norway named Øyra from Old Norse eyrr ‘delta sandbank’.3: Probably an altered form of English or Irish Oran or Orren.4: Probably an Americanized form of German Ohren.

Ormond : 1: Irish (Waterford): Anglicized form of Gaelic Ó Ruaidh ‘descendant of Ruadh’ (a byname meaning ‘red’; see Roe) due to similarity in sound with Urmhumha (now Urmhumhain) the Irish form of the placename Ormond an ancient region of East Munster. The surname Ormond was also adopted by the illegitimate sons of John Butler 6th Earl of Ormond (died 1476). The most famous and powerful of them was Sir James Ormond (died 1497) Lord High Treasurer of Ireland from 1492 to 1494.2: English: variant of Almond or Orman.

Oye : 1: Norwegian (Øye): habitational name from any of about twenty-five farmsteads chiefly in Møre and Trøndelag so named from øy ‘island’.2: Japanese: variant of Oe. The -ye spelling represents a sound no longer used in modern Japanese.3: West African (Nigeria): Igbo name from the name of one of the four (market) days of the Igbo four-day week. Compare Orie. See also 4 below.4: African (Nigeria Gabon and Ghana): unexplained. See also 3 above.

Pink : 1: English: nickname for a chirpy person from Middle English pink(e) pinch (Old English pinc(a)) ‘chaffinch’.2: English: possibly a nickname for a physically small person from an unrecorded Middle English pink.3: German: nickname for a blacksmith from an onomatopoeic word imitating the sound of hammering which was perceived as pink(e)pank.4: Sorbian: probably a variant of P'eńk and Pjeńk (see Penk).

Poehlein : German: probably a variant of Pohley a habitational name in Silesia for someone from a place called Poley (also Pohley) from Slavic polan ‘field dweller’. Misinterpretation of the etymology of the surname makes it sound like a German name ending with the diminutive suffix -lein.

Porter : 1: English and Scottish: occupational name for the gatekeeper of a walled town or city or the doorkeeper of a great house castle or monastery from Middle English and Older Scots porter(e) port(o)ur ‘doorkeeper gatekeeper’ (Anglo-Norman French port(i)er portur Latin portarius). The office often came with accommodation lands and other privileges for the bearer and in some cases was hereditary especially in the case of a royal castle. The name has been established in Ireland since the 13th century. In North America this surname has absorbed cognates and equivalents in other languages for example German Pförtner (see Fortner) and Poertner.2: English: occupational name for a man who carried loads for a living especially one who used his own muscle power rather than a beast of burden or a wheeled vehicle. This sense is from Middle English port(o)ur porter ‘porter carrier of burdens’ (Anglo-Norman French portur porteo(u)r).3: Dutch: variant mostly Americanized of Poorter status name for a freeman (burgher) of a town Middle Dutch portere modern Dutch poorter. Compare De Porter.4: Jewish (Ashkenazic): adoption of the English or Dutch name (see above) in place of some original Ashkenazic surname of similar sound or meaning.

Rice : 1: Welsh: Anglicized pronunciation of one of the most common Welsh personal names Rhys from a form originally meaning ‘rash impetuous’ also spelled Rys and Re(e)s. See also Reese with which it is interchangeable as a result of different Anglicized forms of the Welsh vowel y and also compare Preece and Price. Initial R- in Welsh is voiceless and often spelled Rh- but in English R- is voiced as in the Anglicized surnames Rees and Rice. Welsh y is a short back vowel /ɪ/. In the medieval period the English approximation of this vowel was either /i/ or /e/ lengthened to /i:/ and /e:/. Subsequent sound changes in English produced the alternative pronunciations represented in Rees Preece and Rice Price. The name has also been established in Ireland from an early date.2: English: either a topographic name for someone who lived in or near a thicket (Middle English ris rice ris from Old English hrīs Old Norse hrís) or a habitational name for someone who came from a place called with this word such as Rise (East Yorkshire).3: English: perhaps a nickname from Middle English Rys(e) and Re(e)s which when without a preposition could derive from one or other of several Old French and Middle English words including Anglo-Norman French ris ‘laughter smile’ Middle English ris res ‘stem stalk’ in origin the same word as in 2 above and Middle English ris rise rice res Old French ris riz ‘rice’ perhaps a nickname for a rice dealer or a cook.4: Americanized form of German Reis.

Sand : 1: English Danish Norwegian Swedish German and Jewish (Ashkenazic): topographic name for someone who lived on or near a patch of sandy soil from the vocabulary word sand (German Sand). As a Swedish name it was often purely ornamental and as a Jewish artificial. It is also found in France (see 3 below).2: English: habitational name from a place such as Send (Surrey) or Sound (Cheshire) named with Middle English sand sond ‘sand’.3: French (mainly Alsace and Lorraine): topographic name of German origin (see 1 above) or in some cases a derivative of the ancient Germanic personal name Sando based on the element sand ‘true just’.4: Dutch (also Van de Sand): habitational name for someone from any of various minor places called with Dutch zand ‘sand’.

Schubert : German and Jewish (Ashkenazic): occupational name for a shoemaker or cobbler from Middle High German schuoch ‘shoe’ + würhte ‘maker’. The sound b was often substituted for v in eastern dialects of German.

Sulston : apparently from Southstone Rock in Stanford on Teme (Worcs) which is recorded as Sulstan Suleston in 1214 Solughstone in 1353 and Soulston in 1544. The place-name derives from Old English sulh ‘furrow’ (here applied to a deep-cut valley) + stān ‘stone’ which by a regular sound change became Middle English ston(e)).

Sund : 1: Swedish and Danish: from sund ‘strait sound’ a topographic name adopted by someone who lived by a strait or an ornamental name (often from a corresponding placename element).2: Norwegian: habitational name from any of twenty-five or more farmsteads mainly in Nordland from Old Norse sund ‘strait sound’.3: English: nickname for a healthy or prosperous person from Middle English sund sound ‘sound healthy prosperous’ (Old English sund).4: English: topographic name for someone who lived by a sound or strait from Middle English sound sund ‘sound (body of water sea)’ (Old English sund).5: English: variant of Sand.

Trakas : Greek: nickname from traka ‘crash collision’. In at least one instance the surname is said to have derived from a bearer playing the game of quoits and imitating the sound of the puck colliding.

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Last name frequency

Geographic distribution of the 34 individuals with the name SOUND on Geneanet.

This last name in the family trees

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