Benne

surname · Latin script

Recorded as a male name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise

Benne is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in Congo - Kinshasa than in any other country. In English, recorded as Sesame.

rarermore common
  • USUnited States1 in 504K(measured from records)
  • CDCongo - Kinshasa≈1 in 19K
  • NLNetherlands1 in 69K

carrying the name, as counted by its national register where one exists and as Mondonomo estimates it elsewhere (marked ≈ and "est." on hover). One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.

Congo - Kinshasa (inferred from the name graph)

≈5,500 people, est.

Sources
183 (measured from records)

Highest-authority source

≈1 in 19K (inferred from the name graph)

Congo - Kinshasa, est.

measured from records inferred from the name graph

Name dossier (print, CSV)

Meaning & origin(measured from records)

'wagon basket'; also a base for occupational names

Sources 1

  • Deutsche Namenkunde: Unsere Familiennamen nach ihrer Entstehung und Bedeutung

Attested across 7 languages in the etymology graph.

How Benne is read(measured from records)

Benne is one spelling over 3 language communities, and the dictionaries record it differently in 3 of them. Each row is what a source recorded for that language, beside the share of this name’s records the language holds. No single row is the name’s meaning.

  • English55%

    Sesame.

    as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

  • French18%

    bin, skip

    as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

  • German5.5%

    'wagon basket'; also a base for occupational names

    as a nameDeutsche Namenkunde: Unsere Familiennamen nach ihrer Entstehung und Bedeutung

The share is ours — how much of this name’s records each language holds. The sense beside it is the source’s, quoted and credited, including where it names a gender. We do not publish a gender of our own per language: our records carry one figure for the spelling as a whole.

Where in the world(measured from records)

Benne counted together with the spellings and other-language forms grouped with it. Where a register counted another spelling, the row names it.

Sorted by bearers: national registers' counts, and Mondonomo's estimates (≈, est.) where no register counts.

Where Benne is recorded, by country
CountryMost common spellingSources
CD Congo - Kinshasa#878≈5,500 est.≈1 in 19K—Benne3
US United States—6601 in 504K751Benne183
FR France—≈540 est.≈1 in 125K43—2
DE Germany—≈420 est.≈1 in 190KlistedBenne54
NL Netherlands—2521 in 69K252Benne17
BE Belgium—1151 in 102K115Benne11
UY Uruguay—331 in 103K33——

Exact figures are national registers' own counts, while figures marked ≈ and est. are Mondonomo’s estimates, counted from our sources and calibrated against those registers; hover one for how far to trust it in that country. A dash means neither exists.

Registers cited: Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2010; Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2020; the dfa-band-1 register; CBG Familienamenbank — Dutch surname bearer counts (GBA/BRP 2007); Familienaam.be — Belgian family-name frequency (population register); INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000); INE Uruguay — Apellidos más frecuentes 1902–2024 (Tableau Public). Figures without a register are Mondonomo estimates; see Methodology.

Country figures for a list of names, at full precision, are available under licence rather than by scraping this table (how that works).

Other names spelled this way(inferred from the name graph)

Benne is also recorded as 5 other names, grouped separately because the records behind them do not connect to the one described above.

  • French surname5 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in France, United States, Belgium, Spain

    Also written Benné, Bénné, Bennè

  • Spanish surname6 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, Uruguay, Brazil, Argentina

    Languages: Spanish, Portuguese

    Also written Benné, Bënnë, Bennè

  • Danish surname6 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Denmark, United States, Sweden

    Languages: Danish, Norwegian, Swedish

    Also written Benné

  • Arabic surname4 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Syria, Türkiye, United States, Morocco

    Also written Bènnë, Bênnë

  • Turkish surname3 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Türkiye, Syria

    Also written Bënnë

41 further groups record this spelling and are not listed here.

Grouping is the name graph's, not a register's: two spellings join a group when the evidence links them, so a group is a claim about the records rather than about the people.

Other recorded senses(measured from records)

Benne is also recorded in 2 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.

  • In Hungarian, inside someone or something, in him/her/it, him/her/it

    as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

  • In nds (Germany), inside

    as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

Ordered by how much of this spelling's record each language holds, so a sense from a language the name is barely used in sits last rather than first.

Notable people with this name(measured from records)

19001920194019601980Kenneth Dean Benne, b. 1908Edwin Benne, b. 1965Jörg Benne, b. 1975
  • Kenneth Dean Benneb. 1908born:1908-05-11|died:1992-10-08|; Benne, Kenneth D. (Kenneth Dean), 1908-1992; Benne, Kenneth D. (Kenneth Dean), 1908-; Benne, Kenneth D. 1908-; Benne, Kenneth D.
  • Edwin Benneb. 1965NLvolleyball player
  • Jörg Benneb. 1975DEGerman author of fantasy books

The ten people covered by the most Wikipedia language editions — a proxy for cross-cultural notability, which favours historical and Western figures over equally prominent contemporary ones — shown by birth year. Source: Wikidata (CC0).

Evidence(measured from records)

Attested in 29 sources across 14 countries.

Official registers attesting Benne
CountryRegisterYearCountRank
US United StatesCensus Bureau — Surname Frequency 20202020751#32,755
US United StatesCensus Bureau — Surname Frequency 20002000749#29,662
US United StatesCensus Bureau — Surname Frequency 20102010660#34,353
NL NetherlandsCBG Familienamenbank — Dutch surname bearer counts (GBA/BRP 2007)2007252#8,232
BE BelgiumFamilienaam.be — Belgian family-name frequency (population register)2008115#13,859
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)196198—
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)195198—
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)194193—
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)190192—
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)192190—
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)197178—
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)193176—

Reference works 3

  • Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
  • Wikipedia given-name tokens
  • Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)

These works list the name; their figures are licensed and are not reproduced here.

Register rows as of the 2026-10-09 data build.

Frequently asked questions

Where does the name Benne come from?
'wagon basket'; also a base for occupational names Recorded by Deutsche Namenkunde: Unsere Familiennamen nach ihrer Entstehung und Bedeutung.
What does the name Benne mean?
In English, Sesame.
In which country does Benne have the most bearers?
Mondonomo estimates about 5.5 thousand people named Benne in Congo - Kinshasa, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled benne.
How common is the name Benne?
In the United States, the national register counted 660 people named Benne in 2010, about 1 in 504 thousand residents.
How common is Benne compared with other names?
In Congo - Kinshasa, Benne is the 878th most common surname of 44,726 surnames recorded there.

What do you want to know about Benne?

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Query this name via API
curl -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_KEY" https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/benne

The same payload this page is built from: spellings and scripts, countries and languages, related names, and the registers that attest the form. It takes a free API key (1,000 requests a day), and bulk access is licensed separately.

About this data

measured from records inferred from the name graph machine-generated

These figures come from the data snapshot of and will change as it is rebuilt.

Statistics are aggregated from the Mondonomo name corpus; related names and etymology are inferred from the name graph; pronunciation and any machine-marked transliterations are model-generated. Read how the numbers are made, including their known failure modes, and where the data comes from.

Reference works we consult — surname dictionaries, official name registers, Wikidata and Wiktionary — are named directly, beside the claims they support. The per-country source counts also include datasets of person records: we publish how many there are and their authority tier, but not their names.

Cite this page Mondonomo, “Benne” — the 878th most common surname in Congo - Kinshasa. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.

See how Benne parses inside a full name →