Carden Family History

from Anglo-Norman French cardon ‘thistle’ (a diminutive of carde, from Latin carduus), probably applied as a topographic name for someone who lived on a patch of land overgrown with thistles, as an occupational name for someone involved in the carding of wool, originally carried out with thistle and teasel heads, or as a nickname for a prickly and unapproachable person. habitational name from Carden in Cheshire, which is recorded in the mid 13th century in the form Kawrdin and in the early 14th century as Cawardyn; it is probably named with Old English carr ‘rock’ + wor{dh}ign ‘enclosure’.

Source: Dictionary of American Family Names ©2013, Oxford University Press