Language(s) | Chinese (Cantonese, Southern Min), German, Norwegian, Swedish |
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Other names | |
Variant form(s) |
Eng is a Chinese, German, and Scandinavian surname, as well as a given name in various cultures.
Eng may be the spelling of multiple Chinese surnames, based on their pronunciation in different varieties of Chinese; they are listed below by their spelling in Hanyu Pinyin, which reflects the standard Mandarin pronunciation: [1]
Ng is another spelling of the Cantonese pronunciation of the first two surnames listed above. Chinese Americans in the Pacific Northwest tended to prefer the spelling Eng over Ng. [8] The Cambodian surname Eng (អេង) probably originates from the latter three surnames mentioned above.
As a German surname, Eng is a variant spelling of Enge, a topographic surname for a person who lived in a valley or other such narrow place, from German eng 'narrow'. [9]
The Norwegian and Swedish surname Eng originated as an ornamental surname from Old Norse eng and Swedish äng 'meadow'. [10]
As of 2023, there were 910 people in Norway with the surname Eng. [11]
The 2010 United States census found 10,862 people with the surname Eng, making it the 3,352nd-most-common name in the country. This represented an increase from 10,102 (3,246th-most-common) in the 2000 census. In both censuses, roughly three-quarters of the bearers of the surname identified as Asian and 14% as non-Hispanic white. [12] It was the 179th-most-common surname among respondents to the 2000 census who identified as Asian. [13]