Meaning of Last Name

Meaning: "Urtica", "nettle," from a toponym

Origins: Spain; from the Autonomous Communities of: Castile and León, Aragon, Navarre, La Rioja, Cantabria, Basque Country (autonomous community)

Ortega is a Spanish surname. In the 9th century a Saint Raymundo Ortega of Bejar was recorded to be in Salamanca, Spain. A baptismal record in 1570 records a de Ortega "from the village of Ortega". There were several villages of this name in Spain. The toponym derives from Latin urtica, meaning "nettle". Some of the Ortega spelling variants are: Ortega, de Ortega, Ortegada, Ortegal, Hortega, Ortiga, Ortigueda, Ortigueira, Ortigosa, Orreaga, etc. A cognate surname in Italian is Ortica, in Romanian Urzică, in French Ortie, all from Latin urtica.