-accia

Forms

-accia f (noun-forming suffix, plural -acce, masculine -accio, masculine plural -acci)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin -ācea (in the accusative ⟨-āceam⟩), the feminine of the Latin suffix.^[1] In Italian it is the feminine counterpart of -accio.^[1][2] The Latin suffix first formed adjectives: DELI and Nocentini describe it as a derivational suffix that made adjectives from nouns, and the same Latin ending gave the learned suffix -aceo.^[2][3] In Latin it usually meant “made of” or “resembling”, as in hederaceus and gallinaceus.^[4] Wiktionary analyses it as -āx (“inclined to”) with the suffix -eus.^[1]

The form with ⟨cc⟩ is the Tuscan outcome of the Latin suffix, and the northern and southern dialects have -azzo, -azza instead.^[5]

Meanings

Suffix

1. Forms feminine nouns and adjectives with a pejorative sense, saying that something is bad, ugly or worthless: casaccia, erbaccia, robaccia, stradaccia, cattivaccia.^[2][6][7][1]
2. In some nouns, mostly of Latin formation, it has an augmentative sense or marks a relation with the base word, without a pejorative note: beccaccia.^[7]

Word family

• casaccia
• erbaccia
• robaccia
• stanzaccia
• stradaccia
• beccaccia

Related words

• -accio
• -azzo
• -aceo
• Latin -aceus

Usage notes

-accia is the feminine of -accio and shares its senses.^[7][6] In familiar speech the ending is also used on its own as an adjective meaning “bad, poor”, usually after a word already formed with it: una giornataccia, e accia davvero.^[6][7] The noun accia, a skein of raw linen or hemp thread, has a separate source: Latin acia, from acus “needle”.^[2][8]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
3. ^ Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
4. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
6. ^ a b c Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
7. ^ a b c d De Mauro, Tullio, Il Nuovo De Mauro, online ed., dizionario.internazionale.it
8. ^ De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET