Cortijos may have their origins in ancient Roman villas, for the word is derived from the Latin cohorticulum, a diminutive of cohors, meaning 'courtyard' or inner enclosure.Manuel-Antonio Marcos Casquero, Marcus Terentius Varro, De lingua Latina: edición bilingüe, Anthropos Editorial, 1990, , pg. 69. They are often isolated structures associated with a large family farming or livestock operation in the vast and empty adjoining lands.
