Sachs Family History

German and Jewish (Ashkenazic): habitational name for someone from Lower Saxony (German Niedersachsen) in northern Germany. The region is named for the ancient Germanic tribe that settled there in Roman times whose name derives from an ancient Germanic word (preserved in Old Saxon and Old High German) sahs ‘knife sword’.

The area in central Germany called Sachsen was named after the line of princes who owned title to the northern territories in 142. Jewish (eastern Ashkenazic): surname adopted in memory of persecuted forebears, an acronym of the Hebrew phrase Zera Qodesh SHemo ‘his name is of the seed of holiness’.

Compare Socks and Zacks.