Klepper Family History

East German (mainly Silesian): from a dialect variant of Klöpfer (see Klopfer). German: nickname for a gossip from Middle High German kleppern klappern ‘to blabber chatter gossip’.

German: from the rare Middle High German word klepper ‘knight's horse’ probably originally a metonymic occupational name for someone who tended or bred such animals.

From the 16th century however the term came to denote a low-grade horse a ‘nag’ and also someone who castrated horses.

Jewish (Ashkenazic): occupational name for someone who called people to the synagogue by rattling a stick from an agent derivative of Yiddish klepn ‘to stick’.