E. Rossoni proposes two possible etymologies. The first refers to the archaic Italian term calìa, used to designate mean or ridiculous persons, and also applied to traders of jewellery of little value. In the Lucera area —province of Foggia, in Apulia— there was during the Renaissance a street known as "la Calìa", where these merchants offered articles of recycled gold. The second etymology points to the Greek kalos ("beautiful"), possible in the area of Magna Graecia.

V. Blunda, for his part, links the surname to the Greek Calèas, with the sense of "goodness", from the root kal-, parallel to forms such as Calè and Calá. According to this author, the term functioned originally as a name of positive connotation or as a nickname referring to the ancestor, and became a surname by family transmission in the southern onomastics of Italy. His analysis focuses on Sicily.

The surname presents multiple independent stems of origin (ceppi), arisen in different regions without a direct relation between them: Rossoni identifies nuclei in Apulia, in the Trapani and Palermo area, and in the Nuoro area, in Sardinia.