Updated June 9, 2019

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Family name origins & meanings

  • Danish and Norwegian : nickname for someone who was born on Christmas Day or had some other connection with this time of year, from Old Norse jól. This was originally the name of a pagan midwinter festival, which was later appropriated by the Christian Church for celebration of the birth of Christ.
  • German : in North Germany, an adoption of the Danish surname; elsewhere a nickname or topographic name from a Slavic stem gol ‘naked’, ‘barren’.