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In the County of Cork in Southern Ireland, there is a small townland near Glandore in the parish of Kilfaughnabeg called Brulea. It dates from early times, having been mentioned as early as the 1600's. My family came from that area as English settlers in 1588, probably from the Somerset or Oxford in England. The family of Bruly were in England as early as 1066 and they are found in various armorial rolls as de Braly and de Bruly. Obviously this family was French. There are arms in northern France in the ancient times for the family of de Brouilly and variously, de Bruly, de Braly, etc. It might just be that the English Braly family were originally English - just as some of the Cork Braly's were originally English. The family of Brolly, etc., is a Northern Irish family descended from the O'Brolaigh. An attenuated version of this name is Brehilly.

I forgot to answer your basic question: What does it mean? If it is French, it means "burned." It might have been transferred from use as a last name to use as a first name. English speakers do that with some frequency, but I don't know if that is a French or Canadian custom. As to place names, there are Brule Co., South Dakota, Brule Lake, Minn., and Brule River, Mich.-Wisc. They all appear to be related to the Brule Indians, a branch of the Sioux, whose name is a partial translation for their name, which is said to mean "burned thighs."

Re Brule, it certainly looks like a French name. It might have been respelled in English as Brulea to preserve the accented e at the end, and to prevent naive readers from prounouncing it Brool. The following web site makes reference to a source of study in Canada of Brule as a last name. It's in French. Aloha from Hawaii. http://archiver.rootsweb.com/th/read/GEN-FF/1997-04/0860616554