The authors agree that this surname derives from the Latin word riva (also ripa), which designates the shore of the sea, of a river or of a body of water, and sometimes also a sloping terrain. Its distribution is concentrated in northern Italy, with a special presence in Liguria.

E. Rossoni notes that the surname may come from any of the numerous place names containing that word, such as Riva del Garda (Trento area), Riva di Pinerolo (Turin area) or Riva di Solto (Bergamo area), or else from the fact that the founding ancestor lived near a shore. Rossoni adds that the transformation into a surname is documented in Lombardy from at least the 13th century.

F. Miranda broadens the geographic distribution and indicates that the surname appears in a large part of the northern regions, with the most consistent nucleus in Lombardy, followed by Piedmont, Emilia-Romagna, Veneto, Liguria, Friuli-Venezia Giulia and Tuscany, and with a smaller presence in Campania, Sardinia, Calabria and Sicily.

It is recalled that among the historical bearers of the form Ripa or Riva is Bonvesin de la Riva, a writer born presumably in Milan between 1240 and 1250.