Drack meaning | Last name Drack origin

Is a variation of Drake. Dweller at the sign of the dragon; one so nicknamed because of a dragon in his coat of arms; one with the qualities of a male duck; one who played the part of a dragon in the mysteries and miracle plays.

Drack is form of Drake. Not from the waterfowl, but from Anglo-Saxon, draca (Latin draco,) a dragon. Le Dragun, the Anglo-Norman form, occurs in the Hundred Rolls. Several families of Drake bear as arms the wyvern, or two-legged dragon; and it is worthy of remark that in giving to various pieces of cannon the names of monsters and animals of prey, that of drake' was assigned to a peculiar species of gun, as those of caliver, basilisk, culverin, fawconet, saker-all appellations of serpents and rapacious birds—were to others. The compounds, "fire-drake," and "hell-drake," become intelligible when the latter syllable is understood to mean, not the harmless and familiar denizen of the pool, but the 'fell dragoun' of medieval romance. Sir Thomas Smith, in his trea tise "De Republica Anglicana," speaking of his contemporary , the celebrated Eliza bethan admiral, Sir Francis Drake, (contrary to the generally received notion that he was born in Devonshire,) asserts that he was the son of a fisherman in the Isle of Wight, and that the name of Drake was not his family appellation but an assumption: "Draconis nomen ipse sibi sumpsit, quod est serpentum quoddam genus." He adds that the Dunkirkers fitted out a fine ship called the Dog, for the purpose of hunting and perhaps catching this sca-serpent: "Dunkercani insignem navem in struxerunt, Doggam (id est Canem) a se appellatam, innuentes eâ se Draconem hunc venaturos et forte capturos." Le Drac is an ancient form of the name.