Lauder

Racial Origin – Scottish
Source – A locality

Who had not heard of this name, the name of the famous Scottish comedian, but how many know what the origin of the name was?

It is not, however, as one might suspect from the costume so often worn by its widely known bearer, a Highland name.  It is just a place name, indicating that the original Lauders came from or dwelt in that section.

Lauder is a burgh in the County of Berwick, Scotland, near Edinburgh.  Near it is the Castle of Thirlestane, which in olden days was the seat of the Earl of Lauderdale.

Such names as these grew up naturally as addition to given names at the period when populations were increasing so rapidly that given names were no longer sufficiently numerous to indicate a man’s identity. The name of the place in which a man dwelt or that where he had previously dwelt often was added to his given name to distinguish him from others in the same community of the same name. In the course of time their descriptive meaning became lost and they were accepted merely as the tags of the individual or families. Just as the meanings of given names were easily lost in the thoughts of the population where identity was indicated.