Dillman
A surname probably from a medieval personal name, though older sources sometimes guessed it was linked to a trade.
The #6,061 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 54,549 Americans shares it.
Etymology
Older surname writers did not agree on Dillman’s exact origin. One major 19th-century source simply sent it to another surname, while another grouped it with names built on an old Germanic personal-name element meaning “man.” That makes it likely that Dillman began as a patronymic or byname from a given name such as Tillman/Tileman, rather than from the herb dill itself.
History
In the 19th-century surname literature, Dillman is usually treated alongside Germanic and English name-forms such as Tillman, Tileman, and Dillemann. The name appears in the United States in modest numbers, and modern bearers are often found in English- and German-speaking family lines. Because the early evidence is indirect and the spellings overlap, its precise pathway into any one family can be hard to pin down.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Ferguson’s surname tables place Dillman in the same cluster as a whole family of lookalike names built around old Germanic forms ending in -man.
From the historical record
“DILLIMORE. SeeDilke. DILLMAN. See DiUer. DILLON. The common ancestor of the noble Dillons of Ii'eland was Henry Dillon, who settled in that country in the year 1185. King John, while Earl of Mortain, gave him immense tracts of laud about Drumrany, wliich were afterwards collec- tiA'ely known as Dillon's country.…”
— Patronymica Britannica: a dictionary of the family names of the United Kingdom