Van meaning | Last name Van origin

A prefix to Dutch family names, many of which have become naturalized in England, as Vanburgh, Vandeput, Vansittart, Vanneck, Vanwilder, etc. Like the French DE, and the old English ATTE, it implies residence in a place; thus Hendrik Van der Veld signifies Henry at the Field; Dirk Van der Bogart, Theodore of the Orchard; Rykert Van Buren, Richard of Buren, a town in Holland, etc. So very common is this prefix in Holland, that, in speaking of a person's family name, they call it his VAN; as in the phrase: "Ik weet zyn Van niet." —I don't know his Surname.

Van is variation of Vaux. Valleys.

Van is a form of Vose. Dweller at, or near, a ditch.

Dweller near the place where grain was threshed.

Lastname Van is a variant of Vance. Dweller near a small hill or burial mound; the son of Van.

Of Dam.

Surname is variant of Vaux. 1. It is said that the illustrious family of Vaux derived their surname from a district in Normandy; which is very probable, there being seven or eight places in that province still so designated. It is further asserted that so early as A.D. 794, a branch of the family, bearing the surname of Beaux, Baux, or Vaux, were settled in Provence; which cannot be correct, as heritable family names were not introduced until long after that date. There is, however, no doubt of the influence of the Vauxes in the South of France, and in Italy, at a remote period. A tomb erected in 1615, in the church of St. Clair at Naples, by Hieronymus de Vaux, contains the bones of divers of the females of his ancestry, namely:-
Antonia de Vaux, Queen of Sicily.
Isabella de Vaux, Queen of Naples.
Cecilia de Vaux, Countess of Savoy.
Sibella de Vaux, Princess of Piedmont.
Maria de Vaux, Dauphiness of Vienne.
Isabella de Vaux, Despotess of Servia.

The English family spring from Bertrand de Vaux, who was living in 929, and was a favourite of Robert I, Duke of Normandy, the Conqueror's grandfather. Harold de Vaux, Lord of Vaux, attended William I at the Conquest, and was accompanied by his three sons, Hubert, Ranulph, and Robert. From Hubert sprang the great house of Vaux, or De Vallibus, of Cumberland; and from Robert came the Barons Vaux, of Harrowden, county of Northampton. The heiress of the elder line of this Robert married, in 1553, Thomas Brougham, Lord of Brougham, county of Westmoreland, and hence the title of Henry, Lord Brougham and Vaux. 2. The Old French form of De Vallibus, of the origin of which, as a surname, we have this account in Denton's Cumberland MSS., under the barony of Gilsland: "This great barony was given by the Earl Ranulph Meschines to one Hubertus, to be holden of him by two knights' fees and cornage: he was called De Vallibus, or Vaulx, from the dales or Vallies, whereof that country is full. The French word Vaulx (pronounced Vaux) became thence a surname to him and his posterity there, and to divers other families that took their beginning from the younger brothers of this house." Hutchinson's Cumberland.

Lastname is variant form of Vaus. This surname is said by Sir James Dalrymple to be the same with DeVallibus - doubtless through Vaux. In the XII century this great Anglo-Norman family obtained a footing in Scotland, and were lords of Dirleton, county of Haddington; and from them sprang the Vauses or De Vaux, Lords Dirleton.