An Englishman who travels to the imaginary lands of Lilliput, Brobdingnag, and Laputa and the country of the Houyhnhnms in Jonathan Swift's satire Gulliver's Travels (1726).
From Russianголова (golová, “head; mind, brains"). Probably initially popularized by the Russian-influenced argot spoken by characters in the 1962 novel A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess.