aggiungere

Forms

aggiungere (first-person singular present aggiùngo, first-person singular past historic aggiùnsi, past participle aggiùnto, auxiliary avére)^[1] Old forms include Old Italian agiugnere, Old Italian agiungere and Old Italian aggiugnere, which dictionaries still listed in 1941; northern dialects have Venetian açonçere and Milanese azónzere.^[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin adiungere (“to join to, add”), from iungō (“to join, yoke”) with the prefix ad-.^[3][5][6][1] The verb survives across the Romance languages: Old French ajoindre, Occitan ajonher, Catalan ajúnyer, Spanish ajungir, Sardinian ajungere and Romanian ajunge.^[5][2][7] In Romanian and some northern Italian varieties it took the sense “to catch up with, reach”, which is found in Late Latin of the 8th century; in standard Italian that sense lives mainly in raggiungere.^[3][2][7]

Latin iungō is a nasal present of the root Proto-Indo-European *yewg- (“to yoke”), whose noun is iugum (“yoke”); cognates are Sanskrit युनज्मि (yunájmi) and Ancient Greek ζεύγνυμι (zeúgnumi).^[8] Spellings with the Latin ⟨dj⟩ are learned and appear only sporadically in Old Italian and some old dialects.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first record is a Venetian pact of Aleppo of 1207–1208.^[9][5] DELI dates agiugnere to Brunetto Latini (before 1294) and aggiungere to Dante (before 1321), with the sense “to put in addition, add to a given amount”.^[3][6]

Semantic evolution

In Old Italian the verb covered adding to a quantity or a text, adding something in speech, and summing numbers, and also joining separate things, such as palms placed together in prayer.^[9] Brunetto Latini wrote of the speaker who agiugne fede, adds credit, to his cause.^[4] Boccaccio's aggiugnere legne al fuoco survives in aggiungere legna, esca al fuoco, to add fuel to the fire.^[4][6]

The sense “to reach, arrive” (Boccaccio, 1353, Petrarch) is now archaic or literary.^[3][6][10] The participle aggiunto became a noun for an assistant official (adiuncto in 1327, aggiunto in Bandello, 1554).^[3]

Timeline

• 1207–1208 – the verb appears in a Venetian pact of Aleppo.^[9]
• Before 1294 – Brunetto Latini uses agiugnere.^[3]
• 1292–1309 – agionta, an addition, in the statutes of the Sienese wool guild.^[3]
• Before 1321 – Dante uses aggiungere.^[3][2]
• 1554 – Bandello uses aggiunto for an assistant official.^[3]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive) To add, to put in addition to what is already there: Aggiungi un pizzico di pepe alla salsa.^[6][10][11]
2. (transitive) To increase a quality: La cornice aggiunge eleganza al quadro.^[10][11]
3. (transitive) To say in addition: Dopo una pausa aggiunse che sarebbe tornato.^[6][10][11]
4. (transitive) To consider further, often as aggiungi che: Aggiungi che pioveva a dirotto.^[6][10]
5. (archaic, literary) To reach; intransitive, to arrive.^[6][10]
6. (pronominal, aggiungersi) To be added; to join a group: Alla stanchezza si aggiunse la fame.^[10]

Word family

• aggiunta
• aggiunto
• aggiuntivo
• raggiungere
• aggiuntare

Related words

• giungere
• congiungere
• soggiungere
• Latin adiungō

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Pfister, Max; Schweickard, Wolfgang; Prifti, Elton (eds.) (1979–), Lessico Etimologico Italiano, Wiesbaden: Reichert; online at lei-digitale.it, p. 1, 706
3. ^ 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
4. ^ a b c Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
5. ^ a b c Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b c d e f g h De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
7. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
8. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
9. ^ a b c Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
10. ^ a b c d e f g Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
11. ^ a b c Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse