E. De Felice notes that this surname was formed from words and names of localities of Greek and Modern Greek tradition, whose base is the Greek name of garlic, skórdion. He places its epicentre and greatest frequency in the Reggio Calabria area, within Calabria, with an extension towards Sicily.

G. Rohlfs agrees on the Greek-Byzantine origin of the surname and links it directly to the Greek σκόρδον, which means "garlic." He records its presence in the cities of Catanzaro and Reggio Calabria and in their provinces —Mesoraca, Nicòtera, Soverato, Bova, Gioia Tauro, San Lorenzo—, besides Sicily. He adds that in Greece it survives as a surname under the form Skordòs.

F. Miranda broadens the etymological picture by noting that the surname derives from bynames linked to the Latin word scordium and the Greek skόρdion (σκόρδιον), referring to a plant with a smell very similar to garlic, of the family of the Lamiaceae. He adds a second possibility: that the surname results from the Italianization of the Greek surname skordas, with the same base. As to the geographic distribution, he describes a main nucleus in the Reggio Calabria area and specific zones of presence in Sicily —around Catania, Messina, Enna, Palermo and Syracuse—, besides smaller nuclei in Lombardy, Piedmont, Lazio, Liguria, Tuscany and Veneto.