Family name origins & meanings
- English : occupational name for a leather worker, from Middle English, Old French boulgier, an agent derivative of Old French boulge ‘leather bag’, ‘wallet’ (Middle English bulge).
- Irish (South Leinster) : Anglicized form of Gaelic Ó Bolguidhir ‘descendant of Bolgodhar’, a personal name composed of the elements bolg ‘belly’ + odhar ‘yellow’, ‘sallow’.
- Perhaps an altered spelling of German Bohlinger or Bolinger.