Lehmann
also Lehman, Lehnmann
The liegeman — and one of the great names of the diaspora.
- Origin
- German
- Register
- German family
The seat of Lehmann
Seat vacantChief
No one leads the Lehmann community yet. When the movement opens, you can stand for its leadership, or help elect whoever does.
Current mission
No shared goal set yet. Once Lehmann has leadership, it sets the public focus: a restoration, a gathering, a real-world project that helps its own.
The Lehmann clan is being rebuilt. Join the waiting list for the movement today, and you help decide who leads it and what it does.
Help rebuild the Lehmann clan →What does the Lehmann name mean?
From Middle High German lēhenman — the liegeman or vassal who held land in fief (Lehen) from a lord, a tenant of standing in the feudal order. One of the foremost of all German-Jewish surnames.
The history of Lehmann
The Lehmann held his land as a fief, bound to a lord by oath and service but a man of real local standing — not a peasant but a holder of rights, which made the status-name a common and respectable one across the German centre and east.
It is also one of the signature surnames of German Jewry, and no name better illustrates how far the migration carried them: three Lehmann brothers from Rimpar in Bavaria reached Alabama in the 1840s as pedlars and cotton traders, moved to New York, and built the house of Lehman Brothers — for a century and a half a pillar of American finance, until its fall in 2008 became shorthand for an entire crisis. The German fief-holder's name, written across the largest bankruptcy in history.
Explore With Your Ancestors · Beta
Pick any year from 500 to 1945 and any place on earth — the Lehmann country, or a shore no Lehmann ever reached. The chronicler sets the scene; the deeds are yours.