Last name origins & meanings:
- English: from the Norman personal name Bernier.
- English: from Old English beornan ‘to burn’, hence an
occupational name for a burner of lime (compare German
Kalkbrenner) or charcoal. It may also have denoted someone who
baked bricks or distilled spirits, or who carried out any other
manufacturing process involving burning.
- English: occupational
name for a keeper of hounds, from Old Norman French bern(i)er,
brenier (a derivative of bren, bran ‘bran’, on
which the dogs were fed).
- Southern English: topographic or
occupational name for someone who lived by or worked in a barn, from
Middle English bern, barn ‘barn’ + the suffix
-er. Compare Barnes.
- German: habitational
name, in Silesia denoting someone from a place called Berna (of which
there are two examples); in southern Germany and Switzerland denoting
someone from the Swiss city of Berne.
- German: from the Germanic
personal name Bernher meaning ‘lord of the army’.
- North
German: occupational name for a lime or charcoal burner (cognate with
2), from an agent derivative of Middle High German brennen ‘to
burn’.
|