Hand Family History

English, German, and Dutch: nickname for someone with a peculiarity or deformity of the hand or perhaps to skill in its use from Middle English hond(e), hand(e), Middle High German hant, found in such appellations as Johan metter hant (Rijkhoven 1284), Liebhard mit der Hand (Augsburg 1383).

Jewish (Ashkenazic): nickname from German Hand ‘hand’ (see 1 above).

Irish: Anglicized form of Gaelic Ó Fhlaithimh (see Guthrie) as a result of association with the Gaelic word lámh ‘hand’. It is used as an English equivalent for several other names of Gaelic origin too such as Claffey, Glavin, and McClave.

English: perhaps from a Middle English personal name Hand, a possible rhyming pet form of Randall, though it could also be a variant of Han (a pet form of Johan, John, and of Hanry, Henry) with excrescent -d.