4,343 Global Deans Family Members

Deans Family History

This interesting surname is derived from a byname applied to someone resembling a dean, a church official; or even used as an occupational name for a dean's servant. The word dean goes back to the Latin "decanus", originally "a leader of ten men". Job-descriptive surnames originally denoted the actual occupation of the namebearer, and later became hereditary. As a surname Deans is characteristic of Scotland, and was common in the Hawickshire District, as "Deinis" and "Deins" in the 16th Century. The name had clearly already emerged as a surname by then (see below).