Frequency: (202)
(number of times this surname appears in a sample database of 88.7 million names, representing one third of the 1997 US population)
1. English: nickname for someone with some fancied resemblance to a bittern, perhaps in the booming quality of the voice, from Middle English, Old French butor ‘bittern’ (a word of obscure etymology).
2. English and German: metonymic occupational name for a dairyman or seller of butter, from Old English butere ‘butter’, Middle High German buter.
3. German: possibly a short form of any of the various compound names formed with Butter ‘butter’ (see 2).
GIVEN NAMES: German 8%. Arno, Gerhard, Mathias, Reinhart.
See the Key to the Dictionary or consult the General Introduction for further explanation.
