Benjamin Family History

Jewish (Sephardic and Ashkenazic) English French West Indian (mainly Haiti) and African (mainly Nigeria and Tanzania); Hungarian (Benjámin): from the Hebrew male personal name Binyāmīn ‘Son of the South’. In the Book of Genesis, it is treated as meaning ‘Son of the Right Hand’. The two senses are connected since in Hebrew the south is thought of as the right-hand side of a person who is facing east.

Benjamin was the youngest and favorite son of Jacob and supposed progenitor of one of the twelve tribes of Israel (Genesis 316-18; 44). The personal name was not common among Gentiles in the Middle Ages, but its use was sanctioned by virtue of having been borne by a Christian saint martyred in Persia in about AD 42.

In some cases in medieval Europe, it was also applied as a byname or nickname to the youngest (and beloved) son of a large family; this is the sense of modern French benjamin. In North America, this surname has absorbed cognates from other languages, e.g. Assyrian/Chaldean Benyamin and Italian Beniamino.