Family name origins & meanings
- English : occupational name for a keeper of cattle, Middle English cowherde, Old English cūhyrde, from cū ‘cow’ + hierde ‘herdsman’. (The surname has nothing to do with the modern English word coward, which is from Old French cuard, a pejorative term from coue ‘tail’ (Latin cauda) with reference to an animal with its tail between its legs.)