Buller
A surname with more than one possible root, including a local name from continental places and an older English sense linked to sealing or perhaps even deception.
The #7,708 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 71,685 Americans shares it.
Etymology
The historical sources do not agree on a single origin. One line of evidence treats Buller as an Anglo-Norman word meaning “deceiver,” while another connects it with a bulla, or seal, giving the sense of a stamper or official seal-maker. A later surname dictionary also points to a place-name source, linking it with continental forms such as Boulaere, and notes early bearers like Baldwin de Buller in medieval records.
History
The name appears in medieval records and later becomes established in the west of England, especially in Devon and Cornwall. One 19th-century source says the Bullers of Devon and Cornwall were descended from a medieval Ralph Buller seated in Somerset. The surname also shows up in variant and related spellings such as Bulley, Bullick, and Bullock, though not all share the same origin.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
A 19th-century etymologist openly worried he may have “done the Bullers a wrong,” showing how uncertain surname origins could be even for learned Victorian writers.
From the historical record
“BULLER. A-Norm. A deceiver. Hal- liwell quotes from au ancieul poera :— " The sexte case es of fals bulkrs, Both that tham makes and that thain wers MS. Cot. Vesp, A. m., f. IGl Several Le Bolurs appear in H.R. BULLEY. A parish in co. Gloucester. BULLICK. Bullwick, co. Northampt.? BULLOCK. Doubtless from the…”
— Patronymica Britannica: a dictionary of the family names of the United Kingdom