F. Miranda notes that this surname is a dialect variant of the term gagliardo, meaning "endowed with notable sturdiness and vigour", also applied to a person who is "solicitous, prompt, attending to his own tasks at work with diligent readiness and care", according to Piccitto's Sicilian dictionary. V. Blunda agrees on the dialect origin and on the sense of "gallant, vigorous, hardy", but adds that the term is a loan from Spanish, taken up during the centuries of Aragonese and Spanish rule in Sicily, and that as a surname it would have arisen from a nickname applied to a sturdy man of good bearing.

Miranda documents its predominant presence in Sicily, spread across all its provinces, with the greatest concentration in Palermo, Agrigento, Caltanissetta and Syracuse; in the Enna area it is recorded in localities such as Centuripe, Catenanuova, Enna, Leonforte, Regalbuto and Piazza Armerina. The surname also has specific areas in other regions of Italy: Piedmont, Lombardy, Lazio, Tuscany, Liguria, Calabria, Apulia, Emilia-Romagna, Friuli-Venezia Giulia, Veneto, Trentino-Alto Adige and Umbria.