Chipman
An English surname tied to the old trade word for a buyer, seller, or merchant.
The #6,866 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 63,022 Americans shares it.
Etymology
Chipman is an occupational surname from Old English ceapman, meaning a trader, buyer, or merchant. The first element ceap meant a bargain, sale, or price, and the second, man, simply meant a man. In older spelling, this same word could appear as Chapman, and some 19th-century writers treated Chipman as a variant or reduced form of that name.
History
Early surname dictionaries often linked Chipman with Chapman and explained it as a trade name. The surname is recorded in medieval and early modern English sources, especially in southern England, and later appears in both British and American records. Some scholars also noted place-name forms such as Cheapside and Chipping as related to the same old ceap word.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
The same Old English root behind Chipman also survives in place names like Cheapside and Chipping Norton.
From the historical record
“land. CHIPMAN. See Chapman. CHIPP. See Cheape. CHISEL. Chishall, two parishes In Essex. CHISHOLM. The right of the C's to be considered a Gaelic clan has been strongly asserted, but Skane thinks their Lowland origin evident, and he deems them a Norman race from Roxburghshire. Scot. Highl. ii. 313. The name however…”
— Patronymica Britannica: a dictionary of the family names of the United Kingdom