Winger
A surname that likely began as an old English personal name meaning roughly “friendly spear” or “protecting spear.”
The #7,650 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 71,107 Americans shares it.
Etymology
The strongest historical explanation links Winger to an Old English personal name built from wine meaning “friend” or “protector” and gar meaning “spear.” In that reading, the name would have conveyed a martial but favorable sense, something like “friendly spear” or “protecting spear.” Some 19th-century writers also connect it with the Anglo-Saxon name Winegār and related short forms such as Winga.
History
The name appears in historical scholarship as an English surname and as a development from older Anglo-Saxon personal names. It is also found in place-name forms such as Wingfield and Wingerworth, which helped preserve the same old name element in different parts of England. In modern usage it is relatively uncommon, but the surname has survived in English-speaking countries, especially in North America.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Some older sources treated Winger as part of a whole family of “wing-” names, but the key element is usually the Old English wine, not the modern English word wing.
From the historical record
“[O.E. wine, friend, protector + god, a god] WINGER (Eng.) the A.-Sax. pers. name Wine- gdr = Protecting Spear [O.E. wine, friend, protector -f gdr, a spear] WINGERWORTH (Eng.) Bel. to Wingerworth (Derby), a.d. 1302 Wingerworth = Wine- gar's Estate [O.E. wor^'] WING FIELD (Eng.) i Bel. to WingHeld (Suff.), 13th…”
— Surnames of the United Kingdom: a concise etymological dictionary (2 vols in 1)