Liebe Listers: Klaus is absolutely right. In the olden times a Meyer was the steward or manager of an estate (Gute) owned by nobility (often absentee-landlords). Often but not always it was a hereditary position. Thus it made him an important person in the village. The other degrees he mentioned are also correct - all of these tenants of the "manor house". A Halbkoetner was the lowest who at least had a little piece of land to farm; a Brinksitzer had barely that, often lived on the "brink" - the edge of the village or estate. Hope this clarifies the Meyer derivation. After the agricultural reforms of the mid-19th Cent, many of these Meyers were given, awarded or were able to buy the farms they had been managing for centuries. Jane
Jane Swan
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