Family name origins & meanings
- Irish : reduced Anglicized form of Gaelic Ó Gamhna ‘descendant of Gamhain’, a byname meaning ‘calf’. On occasion the English surname Caulfield was adopted as equivalent.
- Possibly an altered spelling of Swiss German Gaf(f)ner, a topographic name for a cottage dweller, from dialect Gafene ‘large basket’, ‘Alpine (dairy) hut’.
