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Can someone tell me the history or the origin o fthe surname Charles. The most ancient character I know about is Charles Martel, the military leader of Frankland in the early 700's. The name must pre-datae this time. Please help. Thank you.
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Charles of course wa a first name inthe first place.
This is from a previous post of mine:
What is the real etymology of the name? This site has one derivation, quite commonly given on the web and in books: Old High German "karl, char(e/i)l" (man, free man). But it looks like since the late 1960s another explanation is more and more accepted (this is taken from a very reliable book: Das große Vornamen-Lexikon, Duden; W.Seibicke: HDV has the same): pet form of a name beginning with the Old High German element "heri" (army) + the Romanic ending "-olus", used in the area whe West Frankish and Romanic influences mingled. The Germanic H would be represented by a C in Romanic spelling, this is where the C or K came in.
W. Seibicke quotes Henning Kaufmann (1965: Untersuchungen zu altdeutschen Rufnamen. München (= Grundfragen der Namenkunde 3)):
Kaufmann "geht aus von einer Kosef. Háriolus zu german. *Charja-/Harja-, indoeurop. ‘korios ‘Heer’ (vgl. HER) aus, die sich zu lat. Carolus entwickelte"
Translation: Kaufmann assumes a pet form Háriolus (Germanic *Charja-/Harja-, Indoeurop. "korios" = "Army" (same as HER in HERbert), that developed to Latin Carolus. (Germanic H was often transscribed into C in Latin)
http://www.behindthename.com/bb/arcview.php?id=87360&board=gen
This is from a previous post of mine:
What is the real etymology of the name? This site has one derivation, quite commonly given on the web and in books: Old High German "karl, char(e/i)l" (man, free man). But it looks like since the late 1960s another explanation is more and more accepted (this is taken from a very reliable book: Das große Vornamen-Lexikon, Duden; W.Seibicke: HDV has the same): pet form of a name beginning with the Old High German element "heri" (army) + the Romanic ending "-olus", used in the area whe West Frankish and Romanic influences mingled. The Germanic H would be represented by a C in Romanic spelling, this is where the C or K came in.
W. Seibicke quotes Henning Kaufmann (1965: Untersuchungen zu altdeutschen Rufnamen. München (= Grundfragen der Namenkunde 3)):
Kaufmann "geht aus von einer Kosef. Háriolus zu german. *Charja-/Harja-, indoeurop. ‘korios ‘Heer’ (vgl. HER) aus, die sich zu lat. Carolus entwickelte"
Translation: Kaufmann assumes a pet form Háriolus (Germanic *Charja-/Harja-, Indoeurop. "korios" = "Army" (same as HER in HERbert), that developed to Latin Carolus. (Germanic H was often transscribed into C in Latin)
http://www.behindthename.com/bb/arcview.php?id=87360&board=gen
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