Cohen
Sign in to saveCohen () is a surname of Jewish, Samaritan and Biblical origins (see: Kohen). It is a common Jewish surname, and is the most common surname in Israel.
Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- family name
Show 10 more facts
- language of work or name
- German
- different from
- Cohen
- writing system
- Latin script
- Soundex
- C500
- Cologne phonetics
- 46
- Caverphone
- KN1111
- Commons category
- Cohen (surname)
- described by source
- Jewish Encyclopedia of Brockhaus and Efron
- native label
- Cohen
- P8168
- Mingachevir
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Encyclopedic overview
3 sectionsContents
- Origin
- Variants and derivations
- References
Cohen () is a surname of Jewish, Samaritan and Biblical origins (see: Kohen). It is a common Jewish surname, and is the most common surname in Israel.
==Origin== Bearing the surname often (although not always) indicates that one's patrilineal ancestors were priests in the Temple of Jerusalem. Although not all Kohenic lines stem from Aaron, the brother of Moses, he is generally regarded as the patriarch of the lineage and the first Kohen. A single such priest was known as a Kohen, and the hereditary caste descending from these priests is collectively known as the Kohanim. As multiple languages were acquired through the Jewish diaspora, the surname acquired dozens of variants. Not all persons with related surnames are kohanim, and not all kohanim have related surnames.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Cohen” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.