Last name origin & meaning: English, French, German, Polish, and Slovenian; Spanish and
Hungarian (Jordán): from the Christian baptismal name
Jordan. This is taken from the name of the river Jordan (Hebrew
Yarden, a derivative of yarad ‘to go down’, i.e. to the
Dead Sea). At the time of the Crusades it was common practice for
crusaders and pilgrims to bring back flasks of water from the river in
which John the Baptist had baptized people, including Christ himself,
and to use it in the christening of their own children. As a result
Jordan became quite a common personal name. This name appears in the following lists:
Lakes and Rivers,
Cities,
Poets,
Saints
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