Is the surname Schilling Jewish?

Question:This ia what www.ancestry.com has to say about the name 'Schilling'.
Schilling
German and Jewish (Ashkenazic): nickname from Middle High German schillinc, Middle Low German schillink, German Schilling ‘shilling’. The German surname may have referred originally to a rent or fee owed, or have some other anecdotal origin, now irrecoverable. The Jewish surname is mainly ornamental.
German: habitational name from Schilling in Bavaria or from places called Schillingen in the Rhineland and East Prussia.

Hope this helps.

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: This ia what www.ancestry.com has to say about the name 'Schilling'.
Schilling
German and Jewish (Ashkenazic): nickname from Middle High German schillinc, Middle Low German schillink, German Schilling ‘shilling’. The German surname may have referred originally to a rent or fee owed, or have some other anecdotal origin, now irrecoverable. The Jewish surname is mainly ornamental.
German: habitational name from Schilling in Bavaria or from places called Schillingen in the Rhineland and East Prussia.

Hope this helps.

If ANY surname is Jewish, it is only because a number of Jews might have taken the surname (often in the 1700s, though in some Eastern European areas, this was forced as early as 1650). There are no true Jewish surname because Jews used patronymics, not surnames.

A jewish form of name contained "ben" for son of or "bet" for daughter of. So Isaac would have been Itsak ben Ibrahim (Isaac son of Abraham) or Leah would have been Leah bet Ibrahim (Leah daughter of Abraham).

In fact, on purely religious documents (such as ketubah - wedding contract - patronymics are still used to this day). But governments forced Jews and others to adopt the surname methods at different times in the past.

So Schilling certainly isn't a "Jewish" surname, but it may have been a surname taken by a number of Jews when forced to do so by a government.

I believe Schilling is a German surname. Also Jewish people follow a religion, hence you have german jews, polish jews, etc etc, therefore you cannot assume a person is a jew because of their surname, not all Irish people are catholics right??

I think some names are considered Jewish in the U. S. as a large percentage of people who immigrated here with certain surnames were Jewish. However back in their home countries they were fairly common among Jews and non Jews alike

Also, the Orthodox and Conservative Jews state a person is Jewish as long as they have a Jewish mother, not necessarily a Jewish father. They state they get the nation from the mother and the tribe from the father. If they don't have a Jewish father they belong to the tribe of the nearest male relative on their mother's side of the family.

So a person's surname can be O'Reilly and if he has a Jewish mother according to Orthodox and Conservative Judaism he is a Jew.

The Schilling was the old unit of currency in certain Scandinavian countries, Austria and Britain (Shilling). It could, conceivably have been used as a surname in any of those countries. There are, of course non-Jewish surnames like Penny and Pound, both items of currency!
The IGI shows hundreds of SHILLINGs as baptised in English churches, so these would not have been Jewish!
In Scotland there is a surname Shillinglaw, which is definitely not Jewish!
Many Jews did choose surnames that they hoped would confer wealth upon them - Gold, Silver, Ruby, Diamond, Rubenstein (river of rubies) Goldstein (river of gold), Silverstein (river of silver) etc. and their link with finance would also affect their choice of name. This has given names like Schilling and similar a strong Jewish link, but research could prove otherwise in some cases!