The authors agree that the surname derives from a personal name of Germanic origin, linked to the root laud, with the sense of "glory" or "praise". V. Blunda notes that this Lombard personal name shares a semantic field with the Latin laus, laudis ("praise"), although the two lexical traditions are independent of each other. He further warns that the popular reading associating the surname with the Italian lode ("praise") is explained by that semantic coincidence, without there being any direct etymological relation to the Germanic personal name.

E. Rossoni specifies that the medieval name of Frankish origin Laudus is documented in Pisa in 1318, when a certain Laudus Grassus is cited in a commercial transaction with Sardinia. Rossoni identifies two areas of presence for the surname: one north of Milan and in the Varese area, and another in the Terni area, with localities such as Narni and Amelia. Blunda, for his part, records it also in Sicily, and notes that as a surname it survives in areas of central and northern Italy, where Germanic anthroponymy left a dense substratum from the Lombard period onwards.