Family name origins & meanings
- Apparently of Dutch origin, probably an altered form of Paling, a nickname for a lithe or devious man or a metonymic occupational name for a seller or catcher of eels, from paling ‘eel’.
- The surname is common among the Dutch in the Tarrytown area of NY. The writer James Kirke Paulding (1778–1860) published a humorous periodical with the novelist Washington Irving.