Schlecht[1] (from Old High German sleht "even", "direct" or "natural" (cognate with Old English sliht)) is a German surname belonging to the group of family names based on a personal characteristic, in this case derived from a nickname originally used for a straightforward person.[2][3] Like the variant Schlicht it arose before the semantic change of s(ch)le(c)ht/s(ch)li(c)ht from the rather positive "straight", "plain", "simple", "well" to present-day "bad", "evil", "wicked" in the 15th century and may also be habitational in origin, stemming from several small settlements with that name (from sleht in the sense "flat").
Notable people with the name include:
- Erma Schlecht (1919–2009), American real-estate broker and survivor of the Tenerife airport collision
- Hans Schlecht (born 1948), Austrian retired slalom canoeist
- Johann Schlecht (died 1500), German Roman Catholic bishop
- Julia Schlecht (born 1980), German former volleyball player
- Martin Schlecht (former 1976), German cinematographer
References[edit]
- ^ "Schlecht Surname". forebears.io. Retrieved 2020-02-19.
Approximately 8,918 people bear this surname. Most prevalent in: Germany; Highest density in: French Polynesia.
- ^ Bahlow, Hans (1972). Deutsches Namenlexikon: Familien- und Vornamen nach Ursprung und Sinn erklärt. Berlin: Suhrkamp Verlag. p. 456. ISBN 978-3518365656.
- ^ "Schlecht Name Meaning". ancestry.com. Retrieved 2020-02-19.
nickname for a straightforward person, from Middle High German, Old High German sleht 'direct', 'natural' (though it later came to mean 'defective', 'bad'). habitational name from any of various minor places so named, for example in Mecklenburg and the Upper Palatinate, from Old High German sleht in the sense 'flat'.