How does the family name Heller derive from Halle?

Question

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Answer 1

Hey Sgt Rock,

Heller has three different know origins, according to Swyrich.com, German; Jewish; English

German:
Spelling variations of this family name include: Heller, Hellern, Heler, Hellers, Hellerer, Helere, Hellere and many more.

First found in Bavaria, where this family made important contributions toward the development of this kingdom from ancient times.

Some of the first settlers of this family name or some of its variants were: Rudolph Heller, who arrived in Philadelphia in 1728. Heinrich Haller came to Philadelphia in 1733; while Francis Heller landed in Charles Town, South Carolina in 1768.


English:
Spelling variations of this family name include: Hellier, Helliar, Helyar, Hellyer and others.

First found in Devonshire where they were seated from very early times and were granted lands by Duke William of Normandy, their liege Lord, for their distinguished assistance at the Battle of Hastings in 1066 A.D.

Some of the first settlers of this family name or some of its variants were: Isaac, John and Peter Hellier, who settled in Virginia in 1654; Marjorie, Mary, Robert, Thomas Hellier settled in the Barbados between 1654 and 1684; Robert and Thomas Hellyer settled in Barbados in 1685.

Jewish:
No avialable history.

None of those historys explain the morph from Heller to Halle, so, Using the Soundex Calculator engine in Ellis Island site, you can produce Haller and the 'r', could easily be dropped off. So, my answer is that someone responsible for recording the name on entry on immigration somewhere, heard the name wrong, wrote what they thought, and now you have Helle.

Answer 2

If there is a jewish origin than the best possible answer would be,
HELL(ER) [german} HEL(ER) {yiddish} meaning pale, Fair (color)
Jewish Russian Surnames
1. There is no letter H in the Cyrillic Alphabet,so any surname statring with H can be found under the Letter "g".`
Geller is found the the areas of Volkovysk, Bielsk,, Rovno, Novograd, Vladimir, Kremenets, Ostrog, Mogilev-Pod) The surname HELLER (german spelling) existed in Schwaben (swabia) already in the 16th century. There was a rabbi in prague, Yom Tov Lippman ha-levi Heller 1579-1654. If it is of Jewish origin than there were numerous bearers of this surname who lived in Vienna in the 17th century, the family being of levite origin.
Now GALLE found in Vitebsk, Courland and Riga. GALLE comes from the town HALLE in Saxony (germany)
So from my sources HALLE is a place in Germany.
HELLER is a old German surname.
IN Jewish Polish
Heler is from the town of schwabisch-hall province of wurttemberg germany.

Answer 3

back then names (or rather records of) were not as accurate as it is today. it depended upon accents, how well the person taking the information spelled (even if he was interupted and didnt finish the spelling of the name) how he pronounced it, or if they shortened the name (common at ellis island).

some links that may help in your search:

http://www.cyndislist.com/
http://www.familysearch.org/
http://www.ellisisland.org/
http://www.familysearch.org/Eng/Search/frameset_search.asp?PAGE=census/search_census.asp
http://www.ics.uci.edu/~dan/genealogy/Miller/javascrp/soundex.htm
http://www.usigs.org/
http://www.ftdna.com/default.asp
http://www.familytreedna.com/glossary.html
http://www.isogg.org/
http://www.usgenweb.net/
http://www.angelfire.com/nj4/njcomputerchick/gene.html
http://www.tedpack.org/begingen.html
http://www.tedpack.org/obit.html
http://www.vitalrec.com/
http://freebmd.rootsweb.com/
http://worldconnect.genealogy.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi