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The kemp Surname

kemp Name Meaning and History

  1. English, Scottish, Dutch, and North German: status name for a champion, Middle English and Middle Low German kempe. In the Middle Ages a champion was a professional fighter on behalf of others; for example the King’s Champion, at the coronation, had the duty of issuing a general challenge to battle to anyone who denied the king’s right to the throne. The Middle English word corresponds to Old English cempa and Old Norse kempa ‘warrior’; both these go back to Germanic campo ‘warrior’, which is the source of the Dutch and North German name, corresponding to High German Kampf.
  2. Dutch: metonymic occupational name for someone who grew or processed hemp, from Middle Dutch canep ‘hemp’.

Dictionary of American Family Names, Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-508137-4
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kemp Family Facts

Distribution of kemp Families in the US in 1920
Number of kemp families
 219-435
 74-218		 1-73
 0
Compiled by Ancestry.com.au from the 1920 US Federal Census records

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Year

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The information for this map came from Ancestry.com.au’s US Federal Census Collection.
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