E. Rossoni notes that the surname derives from abbreviated forms of the Germanic name Gualtieri, and documents one of its first appearances as a surname in Messina during the second half of the 11th century, with the knight Giosuè Galtieri, belonging to the retinue of Duke Robert Guiscard. Rossoni places it as peculiar to southern Italy: of Ferrandina in the Matera area, of Orsomarso in the Cosenza area, of the Reggio Calabria area, and of eastern Sicily, in Messina and Agira.

V. Blunda goes deeper into the Germanic etymology: the surname would derive from the compound wald-hari, formed by wald ("power, command") and hari ("army, armed host"), with the approximate sense of "host of power". This same base gave rise to the name Gualtiero —equivalent to the Walter of modern German and English—, widely spread in medieval Europe. Blunda adds that the form Galtieri, with an initial palatalization, is characteristic of southern Italy.