Kiper Family History

Americanized spelling of Dutch Kuiper or North German Keuper, occupational name for a cooper. Altered form of East Prussian Keiper, occupational name for someone who caught fish in a trap, from an agent derivative of keip ‘fish trap’, ‘weir’. Altered form of German Kaufer ‘merchant’. Jewish (from Poland and Ukraine): metonymic occupational name for a coppersmith, from central and southeastern Yiddish kiper ‘copper’. In some instances it may have been adopted as an ornamental name.

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