Iller
I don't know anything about this surname. What is the origin and what does it mean? Thanks.
Replies
The origin is German as you can see at http://www.verwandt.de/karten/absolut/iller.html. I don't know the etymology.
There is a stream in Bavaria called Iller - not sure that it's relevant, but I thought I'd throw it in the pot.
Do you who or when it was named or settled around?
No idea, Andy, but there are several places incorporating the name, some "an der Iller", names listed here -
http://www.geonames.org/search.html?q=Iller&country=DE
This suggests that to me that it's more than just a stream. A map I have shows the Iller running through Ulm, and south of Ulm there are settlements with names like Illertissen, Illerberg, etc. If the age of these settlements could be determined (wikipedia?) that might give an early date for the "stream" or river name.
http://www.geonames.org/search.html?q=Iller&country=DE
This suggests that to me that it's more than just a stream. A map I have shows the Iller running through Ulm, and south of Ulm there are settlements with names like Illertissen, Illerberg, etc. If the age of these settlements could be determined (wikipedia?) that might give an early date for the "stream" or river name.
I found on wikipedia that Iller meant provinces in Turkish. Can anyone confirm this? Or if it means anything in German or Old German?
According to my dictionary the Turkish for province is vilayet. There is no iller in the Turkish-English section.
Thanks for clearing that up,(can't trust wiki). That Iller word reminded me of "Illyria", probably with Greco-Roman origin, any chance that river Iller has anything to do with Illyria?
How about German wikipedia, Andy? I've just looked up Iller there and it's claimed that the name was originally Celtic, Ilara, explained as "eigel". I don't know what that would be in English - "fast flowing"?
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iller
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iller