van (Dutch)

Van (Dutch pronunciation: [vɑn] ^ⓘ) is a very common prefix in Dutch language surnames, where it is known as a tussenvoegsel. In those cases it nearly always refers to a certain, often quite distant, ancestor's place of origin or residence; for example, Ludwig van Beethoven "from Beethoven" (maybe Bettenhoven) and Rembrandt van Rijn "from the Rhine". Van is also a preposition in the Dutch and Afrikaans languages, meaning "of" or "from" depending on the context (similar to da, de and di in the Romance languages).

In surnames, it can appear by itself or in combination with an article (compare French de la, du, de l'). The most common cases of this are van de, van der and van den, where the articles are all current or archaic forms of the article de "the". Less common are van het and van 't, which use the similar but grammatically neuter article het. The contraction ver-, based on van der, is also common and can be written as a single word with the rest of the surname; an example being Johannes Vermeer (van der meer "of the lake").