Bok (surname)


Bok is a surname of several origins.

Origins

As a Chinese surname, Bok transcribes the Hokkien pronunciations of various surnames spelled in Mandarin Pinyin as Mu or Mo. Hokkien spellings of Chinese surnames are often found in Malaysia and Singapore, where many descendants of Chinese migrants can trace their roots to the Fujian province of China.
The Dutch surname Bok comes from the Dutch word for billy goat,. Similarly, the Jewish surname Bok, a variant spelling of Bock, originated from the German word for billy goat,.
Bok is the spelling in Revised Romanization of one Korean surname meaning 'divination'. The character used to write this surname, Radical 25, is also used for the Chinese surname now pronounced Bǔ in Standard Mandarin. The largest Korean clan bearing this surname, the, claims common descent from, one of the four generals who overthrew Gung Ye of the state of Taebong in 918 and installed King Taejo in his place as the first king of the Goryeo dynasty.
As a Swedish surname, Bok originated as an ornamental surname, from 'beech'.
Bok is also a Slovenian surname.

Statistics

In the Netherlands, there were 1,751 people with the surname Bok and five with the surname Bók as of 2007, up from 1,197 in 1947.
The 2000 South Korean Census found 8,644 people in 2,663 households with the surname Bok; 7,471 of those were members of the Myeoncheon Bok clan.
The 2010 United States census found 738 people with the surname Bok, making it the 31,383rd-most-common name in the country. This represented an increase from 599 in the 2000 Census. In the 2010 census, 73.71% of the bearers of the surname identified as White, and 21.41% as Asian.

Notable people with the surname