abbacchio

Forms

abbacchio m (plural abbacchi)^[1]

Etymology

It is a word of central Italy whose origin is not fully clear.^[2] Nocentini forms it from Italian a- + bacchio (“stick, pole”), from the phrase agnello a bacchio “lamb at the stick”, which continues Latin agnellus ad baculum (“stick”).^[3][4] The lamb so described was less than a year old and was kept tied with a cord to a stick driven into the ground.^[3] The explanation is E. Peruzzi's (1961), which DELI finds the most convincing and GRADIT, Sabatini–Coletti, Zingarelli and Treccani give as probable: Varro tells that lambs were tied to a stake ten days after birth, so that they would not hurt each other while jumping about, and were kept so until they were weaned in the fourth month.^{[2][5][6][7][8][1]}

DEI, GDLI and Devoto instead take the noun from the verb abbacchiare “to beat down, to kill”, as a shortened past participle like acconcio beside acconciato.^[9][10][11] Prati objected that the verb is not used for killing animals with a stick, and that in several dialects the word means the young lamb still alive.^[12][2] The LEI still defends this view, put forward by Merlo, if one starts from the verb in the general sense “to kill”: its past participle abbacchiato would first have been the lamb slaughtered young.^[13][2] Latin baculum is also the source of bacchio, the pole used to beat fruit down.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Nocentini dates the word to 1620, with the sense of a slaughtered suckling lamb.^[3] Fanfani found it before 1776 in I. Lori, from the mountains near Pistoia, and DELI's first secure record is in Bianchini, 1824.^[2][12] DELI quotes Chiappini's definition of Roman usage: the abbacchio is the lamb still suckling or just weaned, while the agnello is nearly a year old and has already been shorn twice.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The word belongs to the dialects of Rome, Umbria, the Abruzzi and Lucca;^[9][10] Florence has abacchio.^[9][10] Tommaseo knew it at Lucca and outside Tuscany as the lamb raised for sale, and recorded the phrase fare abbacchio “to sell things off cheaply”, like fruit beaten down before it is ripe.^[14] In Lucca bacchio is the young lamb, the Florentine tanners called the suckling lamb abacchio, and in Rome the seller is the abbacchiaro.^[12]

In modern Italian the word is regional, central Italian, and above all Roman: it names both the slaughtered suckling lamb and the Roman dish made from it.^[5][8][15] English has used it as a culinary term since the 20th century.^[16]

Timeline

• 1620 – Nocentini's date of first record.^[3]
• Before 1776 – I. Lori uses the word, according to Fanfani.^[2]
• 1824 – Bianchini records abbacchio.^[2][16]
• 1830 – GRADIT's and Zingarelli's date for the word.^[5][7]
• 1961 – E. Peruzzi derives it from Latin ad baculum.^[2]
• 1900s – English borrows abbacchio as a culinary term.^[16]

Meanings

Noun

1. (regional, central Italy) A suckling or newly weaned lamb, slaughtered for its meat; also the meat itself.^{[5][4][8][17]}
2. (cooking) A typical dish of Roman cuisine made with suckling lamb: abbacchio a scottadito.^[15][6]

Word family

• abbacchiaro

Related words

• bacchio
• abbacchiare
• agnello
• Latin baculum

Usage notes

Abbacchio is also the first person singular present of abbacchiare, “to beat down (fruit) with a pole; to depress, dishearten”.^[5][2] The shorter bacchio is an old or regional variant of the noun, formed by dropping the first syllable.^[7][15][5]

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
3. ^ a b c d e Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
4. ^ a b Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
5. ^ a b c d e f De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
6. ^ a b Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
7. ^ a b c Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
8. ^ a b c Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
9. ^ a b c Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 3
10. ^ a b c Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 1, 7
11. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier
12. ^ a b c Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 10
13. ^ Pfister, Max; Schweickard, Wolfgang; Prifti, Elton (eds.) (1979–), Lessico Etimologico Italiano, Wiesbaden: Reichert; online at lei-digitale.it, p. 4, 316
14. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
15. ^ a b c Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
16. ^ a b c Stammerjohann, Harro, et al. (2008), Dizionario di italianismi in francese, inglese, tedesco, Firenze: Accademia della Crusca; online at difit.italianisticaonline.it
17. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli