Explore the Family Name Dorcas

The meaning of Dorcas

Irish: adopted for Ó Dorchaidhe, ‘descendant of Dorchadh’, a personal name based on dorcha ‘dark’. The surname has been assimilated by folk etymology to the New Testament Greek female personal name Dorcas, which is from a Greek word meaning ‘doe or gazelle’, equivalent to Aramaic Tabitha.

Dictionary of American Family Names, 2nd edition, © Oxford University Press, 2022.

How common is the last name Dorcas in the United States?

Based on the Decennial U.S. Census, the popularity of the surname Dorcas slightly declined between 2000 and 2010. The rank of the name dropped from 71372 in 2000 to 75069 in 2010, indicating a decrease of around 5.18%. However, the count of people with this surname slightly increased from 255 in 2000 to 257 in 2010. Despite these changes, the proportion of individuals named Dorcas per 100,000 people remained stable at 0.09.

	2000	2010	Change
Rank	#71,372	#75,069	-5.18%
Count	255	257	0.78%
Proportion per 100k	0.09	0.09	0%

Race and Ethnicity of people with the last name Dorcas

The ethnic identity associated with the surname Dorcas also reflected some shifts from 2000 to 2010 according to the Decennial U.S. Census data. Individuals identifying as White made up the majority of the holders of this name, although there was a slight decrease of about 4.74% in this group. The percentage of Hispanic individuals decreased by almost 14%, while the percentage of Black individuals increased by 6.52%. The percentage of individuals identifying as two or more races remained relatively stable with a slight decrease of 0.70%. No individuals identified as Asian/Pacific Islander or American Indian and Alaskan Native in either census year.

	2000	2010	Change
White	78.43%	74.71%	-4.74%
Black	10.59%	11.28%	6.52%
Hispanic	5.88%	5.06%	-13.95%
Two or More Races	4.31%	4.28%	-0.7%
Asian/Pacific Islander	0%	0%	0%
American Indian and Alaskan Native	0%	0%	0%