E. Rossoni notes that the surname derives from the Latin personal name Cabrius, in turn probably derived from the Celtic term Cabrach. Its documentation is early: in 1347 appears Nicola di Rienzo Cabrini, a Roman notary known as Cola di Rienzo, who organised the delegation sent to Avignon to call back Pope Clement VI. At the end of the same century notaries with this surname are recorded in Verdello and Taleggio, both in the Bergamo area.

Rossoni adds that in the 15th century a workshop of master glassmakers operated in Bologna that signed its works as CAF (Cabrini Fecerunt), and that in 1510 the priest Francesco Cabrini was born in Alfianello, in the Brescia area. The most famous figure of the surname is the nun Francesca Saverio Cabrini, born in 1850 in Sant'Angelo Lodigiano and canonised in 1946 by Pius XII. Geographically, Rossoni places it mainly in the Milan, Bergamo, Brescia, Cremona and Lodi areas, with presence also in the provinces of Mantua, Reggio, Parma and Piacenza.

F. De Laurentiis proposes, on the other hand, a different etymology: the surname would have arisen from a nickname, a trade name or a place name linked to the word cabra ("goat"), without relation to the Latin personal name noted by Rossoni.