Messier
surname · Latin script
Recorded for both men and women· direction only, no split published
Messier is a surname written in the Latin script, most frequently recorded in the United States. In English, recorded as A surname from French [in turn originating as an occupation], famously held by.
- CACanada
- GBUnited Kingdom
- USUnited States
Where the name is found, darker where our sources hold more of it. No national register counts its bearers anywhere we hold data, so the map carries no figures. One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
occupational name for someone who kept watch over harvested crops. Old French messier ‘harvest master’ (Late Latin messicarius, agent derivative of messis ‘harvest’).
Sources 1
- Dictionary of American Family Names
Attested in 1 language in the etymology graph.
How Messier is read(measured from records)
Messier is one spelling over 2 language communities, and the dictionaries record it differently in 2 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.
- English78%
A surname from French [in turn originating as an occupation], famously held by
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
Mark, Canadian hockey player
as a namePronouncing Dictionary of Proper Names
- French13%
occupational name for someone who kept watch over harvested crops. Old French messier ‘harvest master’ (Late Latin messicarius, agent derivative of messis ‘harvest’).
as a nameDictionary of American Family Names
a surname originating as an occupation
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
de l’ancien français messier « garde des moissons et des vignes, garde champêtre »; surnom d’après le métier
as a nameDictionnaire des noms de famille du Canada français. Anthroponymie et généalogie. 2e édition
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 We do not publish a gender of our own per language: our records carry one figure for the spelling as a whole.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)
Recorded in:
No national register we accept counts this name’s bearers, so the page lists where it is found and publishes no figure.
Country figures for a list of names, at full precision, are available under licence rather than by scraping this table (how that works).
Other recorded senses(measured from records)
Messier is also recorded in one other lexicon, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
In German, habitational name for someone from Messel near Darmstadt.
as a nameDictionary of American Family Names
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)
- Charles Messierb. 1730FR18th- and 19th-century French astronomer
- Félix Messierb. 1876CACanadian politician
- Marc Messierb. 1947CACanadian actor
- Mary Messierb. 1952USAmerican politician
- Jean-Marie Messierb. 1956FRFrench businessman
- Paul Messierb. 1958CACanadian ice hockey player
- Mark Messierb. 1961CACanadian ice hockey player
- Mitch Messierb. 1965CACanadian ice hockey player
- Joby Messierb. 1970CACanadian ice hockey defenceman
- Éric Messierb. 1973CACanadian ice hockey player
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 15 sources across 6 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2010 | 2010 | 4.4K | #7,532 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2000 | 2000 | 4.2K | #7,317 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2020 | 2020 | 3.8K | #8,263 |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1951 | 119 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1961 | 95 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1981 | 91 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1991 | 90 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1941 | 85 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1971 | 84 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1921 | 82 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1891 | 66 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1911 | 64 | — |
Reference works 5
- Dictionary of American Family Names
- Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
- Wikipedia surname tokens
- Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
- jeantosti.com — Dictionnaire des noms de famille de France et d'ailleurs (Jean Tosti)
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 Messier come from?
- occupational name for someone who kept watch over harvested crops. Old French messier ‘harvest master’ (Late Latin messicarius, agent derivative of messis ‘harvest’). Recorded by Dictionary of American Family Names.
- What does the name Messier mean?
- In English, A surname from French [in turn originating as an occupation], famously held by
- In which country does Messier have the most bearers?
- Messier is most frequently recorded in the United States.
What do you want to know about Messier?
Nobody replies to these one by one, but what readers ask decides what these pages answer next.
Query this name via API
curl https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/messierThe same payload this page is built from: spellings and scripts, countries and languages, related names, and the registers that attest the form. Rate-limited for casual use; a free API key gives 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, “Messier”. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.