First name origin & meaning: French: Keeper of the horses; military title First name variations: Marshal, Marschall, Marsh, Marshe, Marshell Last name origins & meanings:
- English and Scottish: status name or occupational name from Middle
English, Old French maresc(h)al ‘marshal’. The term is of
Germanic origin (compare Old High German marah ‘horse’, ‘mare’
+ scalc ‘servant’). Originally it denoted a man who looked
after horses, but by the heyday of medieval surname formation it
denoted on the one hand one of the most important servants in a great
household (in the royal household a high official of state, one with
military responsibilities), and on the other a humble shoeing smith or
farrier. It was also an occupational name for a medieval court officer
responsible for the custody of prisoners. An even wider range of
meanings is found in some other languages: compare for example Polish
Marszałek (see Marszalek). The surname is also borne
by Jews, presumably as an Americanized form of one or more
like-sounding Jewish surnames.
- As the fourth chief justice of the U.S., John Marshall
(1755–1835) was the principal architect in consolidating and
defining the powers of the Supreme Court. He was a descendant of John
Marshall of Ireland, who settled in Culpeper Co., VA, sometime before
1655.
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