Family name origins & meanings
- South German : variant of Kercher (see Karcher), but also from the dialect word Kerker ‘prison’ (Latin carcer), hence a metonymic occupational name for a prison warder or possibly a topographic name.
- North German : topographic name for someone who lived near a church, from Low German kerke ‘church’, or possibly an occupational name from a reduced form of Low German Kerkener ‘sexton’.
- Sorbian topographic name for someone living near bushes, from Sorbian kerk ‘bush’, ‘undergrowth’.
- Dutch : topographic name for someone who lived by a dungeon, Dutch kerker.