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

Safran, 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 Safran surname is from the 2010 census data.

Popularity of Safran in America

Safran is the 24961st most popular name in America based on the data we have collected from the U.S. Census Bureau.

The Safran surname appeared 996 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 Safran.

We can also compare 2010 data for Safran 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 Safran

The surname Safran is of Jewish and Arabic origins, deriving from the Aramaic and Hebrew words 'zafran' meaning 'saffron', the valuable spice. It first emerged in the Middle East and North Africa regions during the medieval period, where Jewish communities adopted the name as a reference to their occupations as merchants and traders of saffron.

In the 13th century, records show the name appearing in documents from the Iberian Peninsula, where Sephardic Jewish communities had settled. One of the earliest known bearers was Rabbi Yehuda Safran, a prominent scholar who lived in Spain during the late 13th century.

As Jewish communities faced persecution and expulsion from Spain and Portugal in the 15th century, many Safran families dispersed throughout the Mediterranean region, settling in areas such as Italy, Greece, and the Ottoman Empire. The name can be found in various historical records from these regions, sometimes appearing in different spellings like Safran, Safrano, or Zafran.

The surname Safran also has roots in the Arab world, where it was used by families involved in the cultivation or trade of saffron. One notable bearer was the 10th-century Arab poet and scholar, Abu'l-Faraj al-Isfahani, who was also known as Ibn al-Safran.

In the 16th century, as Jewish communities continued to migrate, the Safran name spread to other parts of Europe, including France and the Netherlands. One notable figure was Jacob Safran, a Dutch rabbi and scholar who lived in the late 16th and early 17th centuries.

Later, in the 18th century, the Safran name appeared in records from the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, where a significant Jewish population had settled. One prominent individual was Rabbi Yehuda Leib Safran, a renowned Talmudic scholar and author who lived in the late 18th century.

Over the centuries, the Safran surname has been carried by notable individuals in various fields, including Isaac Safran, a 19th-century French painter, and Moshe Safran, a 20th-century Israeli writer and educator.

Race and ethnic origin of people with the last name Safran

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

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 Safran 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 Safran 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 Safran was researched and written by our team of onomatology and genealogy experts.

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

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