Where does “Pauly” come from?

Pauly comes from English Paul combined with the diminutive suffix -ie, which derives from Middle French -ie, from Latin -ia, ultimately tracing back to Proto-Indo-European -kos.

Ancestry of “Pauly”, step by step

Pauly traces back through two separate lines of ancestry.

via English Y

StepLanguageWordMeaning
1EnglishYA figure or mark in the shape of the letter Y; A...
2EnglishyuriA narrative or visual work featuring a romance or...
3Japanese百合lily
4Japanese連用形an inflectional category: the continuative or...
5Japanese見るto see, to watch, to observe, to look at...
6Japanesea dream; a vision; leaving reality to the state...
7Old Japanesea dream
8Japanesean order in biology: smaller than a class, bigger...
9Middle Chinese

via English paul

StepLanguageWordMeaning
1EnglishpaulAn old Italian silver coin; a paolo; Archaic form...
2Ancient GreekΠαῦλοςPaul, a common Roman name, famously held by Paul, the Christian apostle
3Latinpauluslittle, small
4Latinpaullus
Every word from Middle Chinese