The authors agree that it is a Sicilian surname linked to local place names: E. De Felice notes that it derives from the place names Carruba —a locality of the municipality of Giarre and of Riposto— and Carrubbo, in the province of Catania, with its epicentre in that same area. F. Miranda specifies that Carrubo corresponds to a hamlet of the comune of Castel di Judica, and adds that in both localities the cultivation of the carob tree was flourishing in the past.

Miranda goes deeper into the etymology: the surname goes back to the Arabic harūb, which designated the carob plant. In Sicily under Arab domination, kharruba was also the name of a small coin of current use and scant value, equivalent to 1/24 of the dirham, the main coin of the time.

As for its distribution, Miranda indicates that the surname is spread throughout Sicily, with greater presence in the Catania, Ragusa, Agrigento, Syracuse, Palermo and Caltanissetta areas, as well as in the Enna area. Outside the island, it is also recorded in Lombardy, Lazio, Liguria, Campania, Piedmont, Tuscany and Veneto.