Raba Family History

Polish: status name from rab ‘servant; slave’ or an altered form of German Rabe. Compare Hungarian and Czech name Rab. Czech: variant of Rab or a nickname from the dialect rabit se ‘to get excited’.

German: probably a variant of Rabe. Hungarian (Rába): habitational name from a place called Rába or alternatively a topographic name for someone who lived by the river Rába, a tributary of the Danube in western Hungary.

French (southern): from a dialect variant of rabe ‘turnip oilseed rape’ (itself a southern form of rave) applied as a metonymic occupational name for a grower of turnips or rape or perhaps as a derisory nickname.