Irish: reduced form of McCarron.German, Dutch, and
Jewish (Ashkenazic): from Middle High German kerne ‘kernel’,
‘seed’, ‘pip’; Middle Dutch kern(e), keerne; German
Kern or Yiddish kern ‘grain’, hence a metonymic
occupational name for a farmer, or a nickname for a small person. As a
Jewish surname, it is mainly ornamental.English: probably a
metonymic occupational name for a maker or user of hand mills, from
Old English cweorn ‘hand mill’, or a habitational name for
someone from Kern in the Isle of Wight, named from this word.
Dictionary of American Family Names, Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-508137-4
443,506
Historical Documents & Family Trees with Kern
The information for this chart came from the U.S. Immigration Collection at Ancestry.co.uk.
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