christoph machens from hildesheim/germany on 10/28/2006 2:16:27 PM:
yes, the accentuation is like "stockings". it´s absolutely wrong the pronounce it like scottish but with "ccchhhhh", ´cause it´s a rare but very typical german family name. originally it descends from a 1000 years old small village close to the city of hildesheim (the mayor is kurt machens)in the nothern part of germany, which is nowadays called "machtzum" (means: home of a guy named machtherr=lord with power). 1850 two brothers of the big family "machens" (400 in germany, 100 in u.s.) emigrated to the u.s. and founded the village "machens". However: Best regards there!