The history of your name

The BISS surname in the USA

Frequency Comparisons
Total Rank Frequency % Per million people
United States
United States (Current snapshot) 842 27049 0 3
United States (1880 census) 108 29796 0 2
Change since 1880 +734 +2747 +N/A +1
Other Countries
Australia 41 29648 0 3
United Kingdom 545 8353 0.001 12
Top States for BISS by Total
State Total Rank in State Frequency % Per million people
Pennsylvania 138 10790 0.001 11
California 93 24460 0.000 3
Ohio 70 18116 0.001 6
New Jersey 67 14518 0.001 8
New York 67 26818 0.000 4
Top States for BISS by Frequency
State Total Rank in State Frequency % Per million people
Alaska 12 8443 0.002 19
Pennsylvania 138 10790 0.001 11
Vermont 5 15204 0.001 8
New Jersey 67 14518 0.001 8
North Dakota 5 16446 0.001 8

Notes

'A figure of zero indicates that we don't have data for this name (usually because it's quite uncommon and our stats don't go down that far). It doesn't mean that there's no-one with that name at all!

For less common surnames, the figures get progressively less reliable the fewer holders of that name there are. This data is aggregated from several public lists, and some stats are interpolated from known values. The margin of error is well over 100% at the rarest end of the table!

For less common surnames, the frequency and "per million" values may be 0 even though there are people with that name. That's because they represent less than one in a million of the population, which ends up as 0 after rounding.

It's possible for a surname to gain in rank and/or total while being less common per million people (or vice versa) as there are now more surnames in the USA as a result of immigration. In mathematical terms, the tail has got longer, with a far larger number of less common surnames.

Figures for top states show firstly the states where most people called BISS live. This obviously tends to be biased towards the most populous states. The second set of figures show where people called BISS represent the biggest proportion of the population. So, in this case, there are more people called BISS in Pennsylvania than any other state, but you are more likely to find a BISS by picking someone at random in Alaska than anywhere else.

Classification and Origin of BISS

Region of origin: British Isles

Country of origin: England

Language of origin: English

Ethnic origin: English

Religious origin: Christian

Data for religion and/or language relates to the culture in which the BISS surname originated. It does not necessarily have any correlation with the language spoken, or religion practised, by the majority of current American citizens with that name.

Data for ethnic origin relates to the region and country in which the BISS surname originated. It does not necessarily have any correlation with the ethnicity of the majority of current American citizens with that name.

Ethnic distribution of BISS in the USA

Classification Total Percent
White (Caucasian) 799 94.89
Native American/Alaskan 18 2.14
Asian/Pacific 9 1.07
Mixed Race 7 0.83
Black/African American Less than 100 Insignificant
White (Hispanic) Less than 100 Insignificant

Ethnic distribution data shows the number and percentage of people with the BISS surname who reported their ethnic background as being in these broad categories in the most recent national census.

Meaning of BISS in historical publications

BISS. Perhaps Bisli, formerly written Bysse. Ferguson, however, says that Bis is an old Teutonic personal name, and thinlvS Bissell and Bissett may be its diminutives ; but Bissell is found prefixed by De, showing its local origin, and Bisset is said by Camden to mean a dove.

Lower, Mark A (1860) Patronymica Britannica: a dictionary of the family names of the United Kingdom. London: J.R. Smith. Public Domain.


Similar names to BISS

The following names have similar spellings or pronunciations as BISS.

This does not necessarily imply a direct relationship between the names, but may indicate names that could be mistaken for this one when written down or misheard.

Matches are generated automatically by a combination of Soundex, Metaphone and Levenshtein matching.

Potential typos for BISS

The following words are slight variants of BISS that are likely to be possible typos or misspellings in written material.