Origin of the surnames Hückelhoven and Schovenberg?
Hi all!

My grandmother's last name is Hukkelhoven, but according to her, the Hukkelhoven family originates from Germany, which means that the surname was actually Hückelhoven. I've been searching for the meaning and origin of the surname, but I haven't been able to find anything.

Also, the surname Schovenberg was my great-grandmother's, and she was also from Germany. With this surname I have also been unable to trace the origin and meaning.

Maybe someone could please help me here? Thank you very much in advance!

Regards,

Lucille
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Replies

Hi Lucille,

Hückelhoven is the name of a town which is situated in West-Germany quite close to the Dutch border between Mönchengladbach and Aachen. The name was the name of a house in the beginning, later the whole village (and later the town) took over the name. The owner of this first house was Reinhard von Huckilhoven.
I'm not sure about the first part of the name. Maybe it comes from "Huck" or "Hück" which is a dialectal expression for "corner, nook" or maybe from "Hucke" which was a Middle High German word for a "hawker, huckster", or from the surname Huchel, which derives from the first name Huch which is a form of Hugo.
The second part of the name "hoven" which is a Dutch and Low German word for a "(farm-)stead". - You find the same suffix in Ludwig van Beethovens surname which means "from the rape/beet farmstead".

The name Schovenberg sounds like a Dutch or German place name as well, but I could't find any town or village with that name. I don't know what the first part of the name means (I was thinking about words like "Schaf" (sheep) "scharf" (sharp) or "schief" (sloping, crooked, inclined)????), but the last part "Berg" means "mountain".

Regards, Judith
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Read on..... ;-)Wow Judith, thank you very much for all the information! :-D

It's good to finally know what the origins are of the Hückelhoven surname. I think I can now safely say that my ancestor either came from the town of Hückelhoven, or that my ancestor was Reinhard von Huckilhoven himself (or something similar).

Once again, thank you very much! :)

By the way, I have a question for you. Do you live in Germany? If so, could you please tell me if it's possible for genealogists to go to an archive there and find out about one's ancestors? I know it's possible in my own country, but since the laws in Germany are different, I'd like to know. You see, the largest part of my family comes from Germany, and I'd like to find out more about them.

Regards,

Lucille
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And about Schovenberg......After I heard from you that Schovenberg might possibly a place name in the Netherlands or Germany, I went to look at www.multimap.com , and I couldn't find any place called Schovenberg. BUT, I did find a place called Schaufenberg, and that was close to the town of Hückelhoven (which you mentioned earlier). Maybe the original spelling of Schovenberg is Schaufenberg, and then maybe the surname was made more Dutch (because Schovenberg sounds more Dutch than German) by its bearers or people in the environment.

What do you think?

Regards,

Lucille

P.S.: I myself live close to Sittard (in the Netherlands), so both the places Hückelhoven and Schaufenberg aren't all that far away from me (and for so far I know, most of my family comes from Waldfeucht in Germany).
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Hi Lucille,

yes, your "theory" about Schaufenberg/Schovenberg sounds really good!
And yes again, I do live in Germany - and if you are interested in geneology and know the places where to search for your ancestors, you can ask to have a look at the old church books there. A friend of mine did so and found out very interesting things about his family.

The town of Hückelhoven has got its own homepage: www.hueckelhoven.de (maybe Schaufenberg has got one as well...). So you can probably find out something about the churches there.

Good luck!!!

Regards, Judith
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Ok, thanks! :)
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