F. Miranda notes that this surname is diffused in approximately one hundred Italian municipalities, scattered throughout Italy without a predominant zone of origin: Lazio, Liguria, Campania, Abruzzo, Sicily, Veneto and Lombardy. In Sicily it appears in the Enna area (Enna, Nicosia, Centuripe), the Catania area (Mirabella Imbaccari), the Palermo area (Palermo), the Ragusa area (Pozzallo), the Syracuse area (Priolo Gargallo) and the Agrigento area (Agrigento).

Both authors agree that the surname could derive from a nickname linked to a trade. Miranda specifies that this trade would be that of one who made or sold calze —stockings or hose—, which would have given rise to the nickname calzetta and, over time, to its transformation into a surname. E. Rossoni adds the La Spezia area and Abruzzo as zones of probable presence, in partial coincidence with Miranda.