Last name help.?

Question

I am related to the Nasshoffer family and was wonder where is it from as far as origin. I have family from Bursztyn, Galicia. They were jewish, my question is it a Russian last name, Polish, Ukrainian, Austrian? < Other countries could be possible too.

Answer 1

This is the meaning of Nass:

German: from Middle High German naz ‘wet’, a nickname for a heavy drinker or a topographic name for someone living on wet land.

And this is the meaning of Hoffer which is a variant of Hofer:

South German and Jewish (Ashkenazic): topographic name for someone who lived at, worked on, or managed a farm, from Middle High German hof ‘farmstead’, ‘manor farm’, ‘court’ + the agent suffix -er. Compare

Answer 2

Here&#039;s a website that might help you get started.

http://genealogy.about.com/od/surnames/a...

Answer 3

It&#039;s a &quot;Germanic&quot; name, but it&#039;s impossible to pinpoint it to one country. For starters, Germany didn&#039;t unify until 1871 so there were tiny countries, large countries and parts of other countries (like Switzerland) where German was spoken. Some became part of Germany, others were absorbed into Austria-Hungary. Some, such as Switzerland, joined neither country. Alsace and Lorraine (aka Elsass and Lothringen) passed back and forth between Germany and France.  It&#039;s also possible that the name was originally something else and was &quot;adapted&quot; into German when Austria took over. It&#039;s the same as when Germans in the US &quot;Americanized&quot; their names after they arrived. That&#039;s how Kowalski became Smith and Groenberg became Green. Searching by name is difficult in that region because they didn&#039;t have hereditary surnames until the last 250 years. So names were constantly in flux and subject to change without rhyme or reason.

Answer 4

The name definitely looks like a German word.  I don&#039;t have a dictionary available, but the &quot;hof&quot; part usually means &quot;court.&quot;

A good resource is George Fenwick Jones&#039;s book German-American Family Names.  (Many European Jews from countries other than German-speaking ones nevertheless had German-language names.)