Its appearance has been dated back to the times of the Reconquista in the municipality of Valdés, Asturias, where the eponymous lineage began.
According to Luis de Valdés' Memorias (1622), the river itself took its name from the letter s (ese in Spanish) due to its similar shape, although this is considered unlikely.
[1] By the 14th century, the surname had spread throughout the Kingdom of Castile, and later all of the Iberian Peninsula.
During the colonization of the Americas, the surname became established there, where many variations appeared, such as Valdez (by analogy with the Spanish patronymic -ez).
Instead, it derived from the Latin Valdesius, which referred to Vaulx-en-Velin, Lyon, his place of origin.