FRANK JORDAN

Of Germanic origin. The name referred originally to a member of the tribe of the Franks, who are said to have got the name from a characteristic type of spear that they used. When the Franks migrated into Gaul in the 4th century, the country received its modern name of France (Late Latin Francia) and the tribal term Frank came to mean ‘Frenchman’. The name is now also used as a short form of Francis or Franklin.

English, French, German, Polish, and Slovenian; Spanish and Hungarian (Jordán): from the Christian baptismal name Jordan. This is taken from the name of the river Jordan (Hebrew Yarden, a derivative of yarad ‘to go down’, i.e. to the Dead Sea). At the time of the Crusades it was common practice for crusaders and pilgrims to bring back flasks of water from the river in which John the Baptist had baptized people, including Christ himself, and to use it in the christening of their own children. As a result Jordan became quite a common personal name.