Carne Family History

Cornish: topographic name from Cornish carn ‘cairn’, or a habitational name from any of several places in Cornwall named Carne from this word. French: metonymic occupational name from Old Picard carne ‘hinge’ (Old French charnel). French (Carné): nickname for a thin man or alternatively for a fat one. The surname derives from the past participle of Norman, Picard, and Occitan carner (Old French charner), from c(h)ar ‘flesh’, ‘meat’, from Latin caro, genitive carnis. This term was used in a variety of senses, as for example ‘to strip flesh from the bone’ or ‘to feed animals with meat’, and it is from this that the ambiguity of the nickname arises.

Source: Dictionary of American Family Names ©2013, Oxford University Press