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Updated June 9, 2019

Family name origins & meanings

  • German (Böhm) and Jewish (Ashkenazic) : ethnic name for a native or inhabitant of Bohemia: see Boehm.
  • North German : from Middle Low German bōm ‘tree’, hence a topographic name for someone who lived by a particularly conspicuous tree, a habitational name for someone who lived at a house distinguished by the sign of a tree, or perhaps in some cases a metonymic occupational name for someone who tended trees. This is also found as a Swedish surname.

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