Ancestry Name Origin

Like many people, we are interested in the ancestry and origin of our family surname. In his first book, Fred Wampler traced the Wamplers to Alsace (pronounced Al-sack), Germany from which they came in 1741. Alsace is in an area in Germany that had changed hands many times between the Germans and the French. At the time our ancestors came over to America, this area was called the Palatinate and those who came from here were called “Palantines.”

Granddaddy Wampler always thought that our ancestors were German but that was only partially true. They did speak German and lived in a German culture, but as Fred Wampler went back a generation or two he discovered that the Wamplers originally came from a beautiful Alpine Valley in Switzerland. Here he found records of christenings, he visited early dwellings of our family and took a number of pictures of the area. Dr. Wampler was the first genealogist to discover our roots in Switzerland and when he visited, he was the first Wampler in 300 years to go there.

Near the village of Diemtigen in Bern Canton, Switzerland are four houses that lie in the shadow of a wall of stone that rises high into the Swiss sky. The ancestry name origin for this kind of structure in the Swiss/ German dialect is “wandlfluh.” (pronounced vand-flew, well, sort of) . Someone who lived near one of these walls of stone would have been called a “Wandfluher” (again the W is pronounce V) which then became the ancestry name origin Wampfler, and then Wampler. There is even a sign at a bus stop of a place called “Wamplen” verifying the ancestry name origin of the Wampler Family.