The authors agree that this is a surname of Sicilian origin. E. De Felice notes that it may have been formed from the place name Giarratana, in the Ragusa area, or from the demonym of the place names Giarra, in the Messina area, and Giarre and Giarre Pagliaro, in the Catania area; or else, in part, from the Sicilian dialect word giarratanu or jarratanu, meaning "charlatan".

V. Blunda favours a purely dialect and behavioural origin: it derives from the term jarratànu, with the sense of "charlatan, swindler", and would have arisen as a nickname applied to an excessively talkative person, or to a hawker of dubious goods, a common motivation in Sicilian surnames of a mocking character. Blunda further notes that the variant Ciarratano reflects the initial g-/c- alternation proper to the Sicilian dialect.