Orfino and Orfini are Italian surnames derived from the medieval personal name Orfinus, documented in various historical sources. The transformation of the name into a surname is attested, among other examples, in the registers of the University of Perugia, where an Alessander Orfinus figures, enrolled in 1591.

These are, therefore, patronymic surnames that originally identified the descendants or relatives of a person called Orfinus. The ultimate origin and the precise meaning of this old medieval name are not completely clear with the documentation currently available.

The variant Orfini, very infrequent, shows cores in the province of Macerata and in Rome. Orfino is characteristic of Apulia, especially of Gioia del Colle, in the province of Bari, with a presence also in Bari and in the province of Taranto, particularly at Pulsano and Ginosa.

The form Arfino, documented in Argentine registers, probably constitutes a graphic or phonetic adaptation of Orfino. This type of transformation is not infrequent in the migratory and civil documentation of Argentina, where Italian surnames could undergo alterations through transcription errors, oral interpretation or the Castilianization of the original pronunciation.

The scant diffusion of these forms suggests an origin from a reduced number of lines descended from bearers of the old personal name Orfinus.