Dill
A surname with several possible roots, including a shortened form of Dilke or a nickname/personal-name source in medieval records.
The #1,980 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 16,950 Americans shares it.
Etymology
The surname Dill is not settled to one clear origin in the older dictionaries. One line of explanation treats it as a shortened or reduced form of Dilke, while another connects it with an old personal-name source, possibly a baptismal or nickname form. Some 19th-century writers also tried to relate it to Germanic name elements meaning things like "to overthrow" or to an Old English personal name Dilla, but these proposals are not fully certain.
History
The name appears in English records in several regions, including Somerset and Cambridgeshire, and later in Sussex as a place-name connection as well as a surname. Early writers noted forms such as Dyll or Dilke and suggested that Dill may have developed from them by shortening. Because the evidence is mixed, the surname is best treated as having more than one possible English origin.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Older surname studies specifically note that Dill can be found without a prefix in historical records, which helped make it a puzzle for etymologists.
From the historical record
“Cambridgeshire. DILL. See Dilke. There is, however, a hundred so called in Sussex. Dill with- out prefix is found in H.R. DILLER. " To dill" is a Northernism meaning to finish, and both this name and DIP 90”
— Patronymica Britannica: a dictionary of the family names of the United Kingdom