Origin of the name Krugliak

Besides the literal meaning of this family name in Russian and other close languages - in Russian round is "kruglyi" - one can add the following:

Krugliaks in the beginning of the 19-th century lived mainly in the Kiev gubernia. They lived in Zvenigorodka, Boguslav, Tarascha, Shpola, Chigirin and Kanev - traditional hasidic places. One can safely say that the ancestors of this family were hasids. Not just hasids, hasids with an active attitude to life. A testimony to this is the mention of Gersh Krugliak from Dorofeevka in the book "Synagogues, houses of prayer and people working at them in the Pale of Settlement in 1853-1854". The ancestor was either a rabbi or a melamed (teacher of children), or a gabbai ("economist" of the community).

Second, we may conjecture that the name came not from a particular type of the ancestors body but rather from the Yiddish word "krug" that meant "street seller". Later Krugliaks of the Kiev gubernia sold aready not only on streets. They started to own real estate property while some became industrialists. In 1895 Krugliaks of Kremenchug had a factory for production of flour products, while in Poltava they had a manufactory.