In Switzerland, “Maron” is not a very common family name. However, according to forebears.io, there are 289 people sporting this surname in the country (2021). A consultation of telsearch.ch further indicates that most of them live in the cantons Graubünden, Zürich and Thurgau.
The Swiss roots of many of these families seem to be in the eastern regions of the country. Records of the State Archives of Graubünden indicate that the “Maron” clan was already present in Bonaduz since the seventeenth century, in fact even long before this area became part of the Swiss Confederation. It is further recorded by “Dorfchronik Rhäzüns” (rhaezuens.ch) that the family “Maron” had originally immigrated from Italy.
Another branch of the Swiss Maron’s can be found today in Thurgau and St. Gallen. Probably of different origins than the Rhäzünser branch, due to even longer presence in Swiss territory, they even posses a beautiful coat of arms (chgh.ch).
My personal family tree has no Rhäzünser/Thurgauer/St. Galler – at least as far back as I was able to trace it, but it is deeply rooted in the northern Italian region of Veneto – particularly the countryside of what is now the province of Verona.
“Maron” fits into the pattern of typical surnames from this region, with linguistic Venetian origin with consonant ending, especially “-n”. According to italyheritage.com, among the surnames ending in “-n” in the Veneto there are common toponymic, such as Bressan (=from Brescia), Furlan (=from Friuli), Pavan (=from Padua); others are derived from professions and nicknames: Marangon (=carpenter), Ballarin (=dancer), Bordignon (=spinner); and finally there are patronomics: Berton, Lorenzon, Baldan.
There seems to be no absolute certainty regarding the origin of the surname “Maron”. Nevertheless it is well documented (e.g. K. Winkler: “Mensch und Gebirge im Frühmittelalter: Die Alpen im Vergleich”) that mountain guides in the alps – or mountaineers – have long been identified as “Marrons”, a word which could have derived from the ancient Celtic “marra”, with evident widespread use in the alps – from Provence to Tirol – and meaning “scree”, or broken rock fragments at the base of a mountain cliff…
Whatever the origins, I am quite happy to be a mountaineer myself, living in the most beautiful canton of the confederation: Bern.