E. Rossoni and B. Zuanella agree that the surname derives from a nickname of Slovenian origin linked to the liveliness of the ancestor.

E. Rossoni derives it from the term pokovec, which designates a very restless and lively child, who literally jumps from one side to the other like a kid goat.

B. Zuanella identifies it as an endemic surname, typical of Rodda, documented from the beginning of the 17th century, from where it emigrated to other villages of the Natisone valley (for example Ponteacco, in the municipality of San Pietro al Natisone).

Zuanella notes that the surname recalls the Slovenian noun pòk ('crack, bang') and the verb pokati ('to crack, to bang'), and originally could designate a person who cracked the whip, that is, a carter (according to the Slovenian-German dictionary of Pleteršnik, entry pokovec, p. 117). He proposes as the most plausible interpretation, according to the Dictionary of the Slovenian literary language (SSKJ, p. 738), that of an expressive word designating a beardless, still immature boy. The surname could derive from the nickname Pokovec (Pokovaz in the Slovenian dialect of the Natisone), which originally designated not only an immature but also a lively and restless boy, like a kid goat. At the base would be the dialect word pòk ("male goat, kid," not preserved in the Slovenian dialect of the Natisone, a Germanic loanword from Bock); the nickname, turned into a surname, would have arisen with the suffix -ec (-ac in the Natisone dialect) from the adjectival form pokav/pokov. This information is taken from the ESSJ (Etimološki slovar slovenskega jezika, III, p. 76, entry pòk, written by the linguist Metka Furlan), according to which from this base also arose the surnames Pokovec and Pok.