The surname is related to the word *bulli- ("container"), documented throughout the Alpine arc, including the Ladin speech and the Italian of the centre and north, also with the sense of "(wooden) container for transporting milk". There are records also from French Switzerland and Alpine France. The reading is linked with the Friulian bujàn ("wide container in which milk is kept to remove the cream, in the Carnia"), a form with a suffix from bùi, with the same sense. Parallels are the Venetian bugiòl and the Piedmontese buya. An interesting Tuscan parallel: the Italian bugliòlo ("wooden bucket") gave, in 13th-century Tuscany, the nickname Buglectus. Over time this denomination became a surname. An attempt had also been made to explain the surname from the Friulian buligâ ("to boil, to move") or, in popular opinion, from the place of origin Buia, but the author leans towards the interpretation linked to the container. The variant Bul(l)igan presents an added -g- to avoid the hiatus. The place name Pecol di Bulians, in Clauzetto, probably takes its name from the Bullian family and not the other way around.