The authors agree that this surname derives from the southern dialectal word tarallo, which designates a kind of baked biscuit or ring-shaped cracker, crunchy and circular in form, very widespread in the popular baking of southern Italy. E. De Felice documents the Latinized form Tarallus as early as the 13th century, with records in Bari and Brindisi, which indicates that the surname arose from a medieval nickname and that its greatest frequency is concentrated in the Naples area.

V. Blunda analyses the term from the Sicilian perspective and notes that the nickname could have been applied to a person of rounded figure or linked to the making of these biscuits in local ovens, thus suggesting two distinct motivations for its origin as a surname. Both authors agree that the starting point is a nickname of descriptive or professional character, although De Felice emphasises the documentary antiquity of the term in Apulia, while Blunda centres his analysis on Sicily.