Family name origins & meanings
- German and French : from a Germanic personal name of uncertain origin. It may have been originally a byname meaning ‘crow’. Compare Old High German hruoh, Old English hrōc, an imitative formation, but Dauzat derives it from a root hroc ‘rest’. The name was fairly common in the Middle Ages and was sometimes bestowed in honor of a 14th-century saint (Latinized name Rochus) of Montpellier, remembered for his miraculous healings during an outbreak of the plague in northern Italy.
- Jewish (Ashkenazic) : variant of Rauch.