German and/or Jewish?

[Inese]

I knew a Jew named Hollander. Casper Weinberger was Jewish. And Henry Kissinger.

Hmm yes i have looked and it is true! They are location surenames , that is sure. The name Kissing comes from Kissingen its a town.

I looked a little and the German wikipedia article is very informative on Jewish names!!
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jüdischer_Familienname

The english Wikipedia article is useless for German Jewish names it has not the informations of the German article!! I try a summary okay?? The article says that German jews had no steady family name before end of 18. century. The praktice before was that they took the name of the father as a surname ( Jakob ben Nathan = Jakob, Son of Nathan )!!

At the end of 18. century the absoluteistic states made it mandatory for jews to take steady surnames if they want enhanced peoples rights. It hapened 1787 first in Austria and other German states followed!! And 1808 Napoleon made a decret ( décret infâme ) that all jews need to take a steady surname and other countries followed with the regulation.
Jews could not pick a free name and sometimes they were degorating ( Trinker, Bettelarm ,Maulwurf ) but they could it change later. Often they took a name near the normal German names to not attract attention. But often jew names are different because the jews liked synonyms , thinking around corners , malapropism ( ??? translator word lol ) and self irony.

But a other site with some information in English is here ---- second paragraph is about jewish names.

http://german.about.com/library/weekly/aa050399.htm

Interesting passage is that: The name they received sometimes depended on how much a family could afford to pay. Wealthier familes received German names that had a pleasant or prosperous sound (Goldstein, gold stone, Rosenthal, rose valley), while the less prosperous had to settle for less prestigious names based on a place (Schwab, from Swabia), an occupation (Schneider, tailor), or a characteristic (Grün, green).

Money money money what suprise!

[Loki]

Most of my German ancestors are from pre-1700 Germany ... and most were survivors/escapees of the Thirty Years War. Protestant Christians, no Jews among them.

[SwordoftheVistula]

Jewish last names are all names containing

Ruben/Rubin
Gold/Gelt/Geld/Gould
Silver/Silber
Stein/Shteyn/Steyn
Fein/Fine
Ehren
David
Abram/Abraham
Lieb
Blum/Bloom
Crystal/Kristol
Got-
Gut-
Levin
Israel
Wexler/Weschler
Cohen/Kohen/Cohn/Kohn
Kagan
Stern
Gross
Singer
Sekuklow/Sokolov


Any German city name +er, for example Berliner, Frankfurter, Hamburger, Breslauer, Danziger, Wiener (Wien being how they spell Vienna in German)

end in -kin

ending in -baum

-off




Sometimes or often jewish, sometimes not:

Berg/Burg
Rosen (sometimes Anglicized to 'Rose')

names ending in -bach

Green
Gentile
Schneider
-weis/weiss

Frank
-heim

Fried-

Schwartz
Sanders
Cowen

Stone (converted from Stein)
White (converted from Weiss)
Black (converted from Schwartz)

ending in -zer, -ner, itz or -ler


names ending in -wicz or -witz (more often -witz)



Jews often, but not always, have biblical first names (Rachel, Adam, Levi, Michael, David, Jacob, Isaac) or for some strange reason Scottish/British last names as first names (Morris, Malcolm, Allen, Ross, Glenn, Murray, Shay, Lawrence, Walter, Norman, Bradley)

[Jamt]

Berg names iis wery common in Sweden and not Jewish.

[SwordoftheVistula]

Berg names iis wery common in Sweden and not Jewish.

Alright, moved to the sometimes/often category. More often than not, people with names like Annenberg are jewish, apparently this is not always the case.

[Loyalist]

Excellent list, although I do have an ancestor named Kuhn, and then there are Kühn and Kühne, none of which are Jewish or derived from "Cohen". The leader of the German American Bund was Fritz Kuhn, for example. I would also hesitate to categorize everything with "Stein" thrown in as potentially Jewish.

[Electronic God-Man]

Any German city name +er, for example Berliner, Frankfurter, Hamburger, Breslauer, Danziger, Wiener (Wien being how they spell Vienna in German)

Maybe large cities, but not towns.

Very many German names are like this. Rissinger, Huntzinger, Hollinger, Eilenberger, Dieffenderfer, etc.

[Lulletje Rozewater]

I think records exist going back to 1787. Genealogical research may be the only way to be sure.

In the US certain German names are assumed to be Jewish if they contain berg, stein, feld, gold, silver, rosen, stern, thal, green, roth etc... Roosevelt was originally Rosenfelt which is why some people think FDR was a Jew but Rosenfelt predates the adoption of surnames by German Jews.

US Jews are not shy about changing their names. For example Murray Rothstein who became Sumner Redstone.

Easy for us in South Africa
Hoffmann with a big nose and somewhat curly hair is jewish,without these also jewish

[Loki]

Easy for us in South Africa
Hoffmann with a big nose and somewhat curly hair is jewish,without these also jewish

What are you talking about? This is not true. Hoffman is one of the surnames of the founding families, came to SA in the late 17th century. They were German Protestant Christians, not Jews. If you are talking about recent 20th century immigrants, this may be the case.

[Lulletje Rozewater]

What are you talking about? This is not true. Hoffman is one of the surnames of the founding families, came to SA in the late 17th century. They were German Protestant Christians, not Jews. If you are talking about recent 20th century immigrants, this may be the case.

I know Loki,but I wrote Hoffmann not Hoffman