Boy name origins & meanings
- Old French : Free man
Family name origins & meanings
- English : status name from Middle English frankelin ‘franklin’, a technical term of the feudal system, from Anglo-Norman French franc ‘free’ (see Frank 2) + the Germanic suffix -ling. The status of the franklin varied somewhat according to time and place in medieval England; in general, he was a free man and a holder of fairly extensive areas of land, a gentleman ranked above the main body of minor freeholders but below a knight or a member of the nobility.
- The surname is also borne by Jews, in which case it represents an Americanized form of one or more like-sounding Jewish surnames.
- In modern times, this has been used to Americanize François, the French form of Francis.
- The American statesman and scientist Benjamin Franklin (1706–90) was the son of Josiah Franklin, a chandler (dealer in soap and candles), who had emigrated in about 1682 from Ecton, Northamptonshire, to Boston, MA, where his son was born.
