Brock Family History

English, Scottish, and North German: variant of Brook. English and Scandinavian: nickname for a person supposedly resembling a badger from Middle English brok(ke) ‘badger’ (Old English brocc) and Danish brok (a word of Celtic origin; compare Welsh broch, Cornish brogh, Irish broc).

In the Middle Ages, badgers were regarded as unpleasant creatures. Dutch and Flemish: from a personal name, a short form of Brockert. Dutch and Flemish: topographic name, a variant of Broek ‘water meadow, flood plain’ (see Vandenbroek).

South German: nickname for a stout and strong man from Middle High German brocke ‘lump, piece’. North German: topographic name for someone who lived near a marsh (compare standard German Bruch), from Middle Low German brōk ‘swamp, moor’, or a habitational name from any of various places called Broch and Brock.

This surname is also found in Denmark. Jewish (Ashkenazic): probably an acronymic surname from the first letters of Hebrew ben rabi ‘son of rabbi’ and of each part of a Yiddish double male personal name; see also Brill.

Jewish (from Poland): habitational name from Brok, a place in Poland.