LOUIS MILLER

(French) name, of Germanic (Frankish) origin, from hlōd ‘fame’ + wīg ‘war’. It was very common in French royal and noble families. Louis I (778–840) was the son of Charlemagne, who ruled as both King of France and Holy Roman Emperor. Altogether, the name was borne by sixteen kings of France up to the French Revolution, in which Louis XVI perished. Louis XIV, ‘the Sun King’ (1638–1715), reigned for seventy-two years (1643–1715), presiding in the middle part of his reign over a period of unparalleled French power and prosperity. In modern times Louis is also found in the English-speaking world (usually pronounced ‘loo-ee’). In Britain the Anglicized form Lewis is rather more common, whereas in America the reverse is true.

English and Scottish: occupational name for a miller. The standard modern vocabulary word represents the northern Middle English term, an agent derivative of mille ‘mill’, reinforced by Old Norse mylnari (see Milner). In southern, western, and central England Millward (literally, ‘mill keeper’) was the usual term. The American surname has absorbed many cognate surnames from other European languages, for example French Meunier, Dumoulin, Demoulins, and Moulin; German Mueller; Dutch Molenaar; Italian Molinaro; Spanish Molinero; Hungarian Molnár; Slavic Mlinar, etc.