Find out how popular the last name Graeber is in the United States and learn more about the meaning, history, and race and ethnic origin of people in America who are named Graeber.

Graeber, like all of the last names we have data for, is identified by the U.S. Census Bureau as a surname which has more than 100 occurrences in the United States in the Decennial Census survey. The most recent statistics we have for the Graeber surname is from the 2010 census data.

Popularity of Graeber in America

Graeber is the 20183rd most popular name in America based on the data we have collected from the U.S. Census Bureau.

The Graeber surname appeared 1,321 times in the 2010 census and if you were to sample 100,000 people in the United States, approximately 0 people would have the surname Graeber.

We can also compare 2010 data for Graeber to data from the previous census in 2000. The table below contains all of the statistics for both years in a side-by-side comparison.

The history of the last name Graeber

The surname Graeber has its origins in Germany, where it first emerged in the late medieval period, around the 13th or 14th century. It is derived from the Middle High German word "graben," which means "to dig" or "to excavate," and likely referred to someone who worked as a digger or ditch-maker.

One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Graeber can be found in the Deutsches Familiennamen-Lexikon, a comprehensive dictionary of German surnames, which cites a record from 1295 in Thuringia, a region in central Germany. This entry mentions a person named Hermannus Grabere, which is believed to be an early variant of the modern spelling.

Over time, the name spread to other parts of Germany, and various spellings emerged, including Greber, Gräber, and Gräbner. These variations reflect regional linguistic differences and the evolution of the German language.

In the 16th century, a notable figure bearing the name Graeber was Georg Graeber, a German humanist scholar and theologian born in Saxony around 1506. He studied at the University of Wittenberg and later became a professor of theology at the University of Jena.

Another significant individual with this surname was Johann Graeber, a 17th-century German composer and organist born in Nuremberg in 1623. He served as the organist at the St. Sebaldus Church in Nuremberg and is remembered for his contributions to the development of Baroque music.

The name Graeber also has a presence in the historical records of Switzerland, where it is believed to have been introduced by German immigrants. One notable Swiss figure with this surname was Jakob Graeber, a 19th-century politician and journalist born in Zurich in 1828. He played a prominent role in the Swiss democratic movement and advocated for social reforms.

In the 20th century, one of the most well-known individuals named Graeber was the American anthropologist and anarchist activist David Graeber, born in 1961. He gained international recognition for his work on economic anthropology, social movements, and political theory, and was a leading figure in the Occupy Wall Street movement.

While the surname Graeber may have originated in Germany, it has since spread to various parts of the world, including the United States, Canada, and Australia, due to immigration patterns and global mobility.

Race and ethnic origin of people with the last name Graeber

We also have some data on the ancestry of people with the surname Graeber.

The below race categories are the modified race categories used in the Census Bureau's population estimates program. All people were categorized into six mutually exclusive racial and Hispanic origin groups:

1. White only
2. Black only
3. American Indian and Alaskan Native only
4. Asian and Pacific Islander only
5. Hispanic
6. Two or More Races

For the most recent 2010 census data, the race/ethnic origin breakdown for Graeber was:

Note: Any fields showing (S) means the data was suppressed for privacy so that the data does not in any way identify any specific individuals.

Since we have data from the previous census in 2000, we can also compare the values to see how the popularity of Graeber has changed in the 10 years between the two census surveys.

Data source

The last name data and ethnic breakdown of last names is sourced directly from the Decennial Census survey, conducted every 10 years by the United States Census Bureau.

The history and meaning of the name Graeber was researched and written by our team of onomatology and genealogy experts.

If you have a correction or suggestion to improve the history of Graeber, please contact us.

Reference this page

We spend a lot of resources downloading, cleaning, merging, and formatting the data that is shown on the site.

If you found the data or information on this page useful in your research, please use the tool below to properly cite or reference Name Census as the source. We appreciate your support!