Daily AncestorTagelöhner
A Tagelöhner was a day laborer: a man hired and paid by the day, usually for farm work, with no farm of his own.
The word joins Tag (day) and Lohn (wage). A Tagelöhner took work where he found it, usually on farms and estates, and was paid for each day worked rather than hired for a year. Taglöhner is another form of the word.
In a church book the title places a family near the bottom of village society. It is a different status from a Knecht, a servant who lived on one farm, and from a Bauer, who held his own farm.
As seen in a recordBaptism register of a German parish, 1840s
Michael Rebenstock, Tagelöhner allhier, und Eva geb. Saurwein
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Daily Ancestor. "Tagelöhner." Dictionary of Old Record Words. https://dailyancestor.com/dictionary/german/tageloehner. Last checked 2026-10-28.