Frequency: (768)
(number of times this surname appears in a sample database of 88.7 million names, representing one third of the 1997 US population)
1. German: from a short form of a Slavic equivalent of the personal name Valentinus.
2. Dutch: from balk ‘timber’, ‘beam’, hence a metonymic occupational name for a carpenter or a nickname for a big man.
See the Key to the Dictionary or consult the General Introduction for further explanation.
