E. Rossoni notes that the surname is documented mainly in the Savona area (Liguria), with a lesser presence in the Catania area (Sicily), and derives it from the Lombard name Wardon, itself linked to the Lombard term wardon, meaning "guardian".

V. Blunda goes deeper into the etymology and specifies that the surname is of Germanic root, derived from the personal name Wardone, an augmentative form of Guardo, built on the root wardu —"guard, custody"— with the Italian suffix -one. According to Blunda, this suffix, applied to names of trade or function, indicated in medieval onomastics the outstanding practitioner of the activity designated. The surname survives in areas of southern Italy of Lombard stamp, where Germanic anthroponymy formed a dense substratum from the early Middle Ages through to the late medieval period.