Cotieville is an unincorporated rural community within Laurentian Valley, just east of Pembroke, with origins tied to 19th-century farming settlement. It emerged at a rural crossroads in Pembroke Township, named for the Cotie family who held extensive farmland in the area. The hamlet never developed into a serviced village, but it was long recognized as a minor landmark in land descriptions and on survey plans.

The community followed the typical Ontario concession grid, but local watercourses and farm lane deviations resulted in irregular field occupation over time. While Cotieville lacked rail service or a commercial centre, the steady rural occupancy led to several severances, lot consolidations, and natural parcel evolutions that now complicate straightforward lot retracements.

Surveyors working in Cotieville contend with layered land use patterns based on long-standing family occupation. Crown lot lines are often offset by fence lines and historic field use. While most surveys rely on the original township plan, many parcels today reflect occupation lines or unregistered divisions. Modern survey work may involve retracing older metes and bounds descriptions or reconciling driveway alignments and drainage features against historical concessions.