anno

Forms

anno m (plural anni, diminutive annetto)^[1] Old Italian and dialect forms include northern Old Italian ano and Old Italian an, Ligurian and Vicentine agno and Sicilian annu.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin annus (“year”), from the accusative ⟨annum⟩.^[4][5][6][1] The word survives in every Romance language: French an, Occitan an, Catalan any, Spanish año, Portuguese ano, Sardinian annu, Friulian an, Dalmatian jan and Romanian an.^[5][2][7] In the sense “last year” central and northern Italian dialects and Romanian agree in using the bare word.^[8][9]

The Latin noun continues Proto-Italic *atnos, which also gave Oscan akeneí (“in the year”) and Umbrian acnu (“years”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂et-no-, probably from a root *h₂et- (“to go”): the year is what goes round.^[10][1][5] Its closest relative outside Italic is the dative plural Gothic 𐌰𐌸𐌽𐌰𐌼 (aþnam, “years”), and the same root is in Sanskrit अतति (atati, “he wanders”).^[10][1][11] The geminate ⟨-nn-⟩ comes from ⟨-tn-⟩, as in Latin penna.^[1] The ancients linked the word with anus (“ring”), as Varro did and Isidore after him, a connection GDLI calls mistaken.^[12]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is the Placito di Capua of 960, one of the earliest texts in Italian: “Sao ko kelle terre, per kelle fini que ki contene, trenta anni le possette parte sancti Benedicti” (I know that those lands, within the boundaries described here, were held for thirty years by the party of Saint Benedict).^[4][3][12] The sense is a period of twelve months, used to measure a length of time.^[3]

Semantic evolution

Old Italian already used the word for the sun's yearly course through the zodiac, for a lunar year of twelve lunations, for the age of a living being and for dates;^[3][2] anni Domini was a 13th-century administrative and church formula from Medieval Latin anno Domini.^[3][2] Mal anno “misfortune”, often paired with mal dì, became the noun malanno, and the curse mannaggia goes back to malanno aggia (may he have bad luck).^[3][2][9]

Derivatives followed: annoso “aged” in Leon Battista Alberti (1437–1438) and annata, at first a year's salary or rent, in Machiavelli (1522–1525).^[4] The expressions anni venti, anni trenta for decades were discussed by Migliorini, who traced them to Russian through Vogüé's Le roman russe (1886) and the Slavist Ettore Lo Gatto (1925), while Klajn put their spread after about 1960 down to English the Twenties.^[4]

Timeline

• 960 – The Placito di Capua has anni “years”.^[4][3]
• 1250 – Giacomo da Lentini uses anno.^[2]
• 13th century – Anni Domini is used in administrative and church documents.^[2]
• 1437–1438 – Annoso is recorded in Leon Battista Alberti.^[4]
• 1522–1525 – Annata is recorded in Machiavelli.^[4]
• 1925 – Ettore Lo Gatto spreads the use of anni with a decade.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. (astronomy) year, the time the Earth takes to go once round the Sun, about 365 days.^[6][13][14]
2. A period of twelve months from any given day: abito qui da due anni.^[6][15]
3. The calendar year, from 1 January to 31 December: l'anno prossimo andiamo in Sicilia.^[6][13][16]
4. A year of a particular activity, such as a school or academic year: è al secondo anno di medicina.^[13][16]
5. (plural) Years of age: mio fratello ha dodici anni.^[6][13]
6. (plural) A period of history, especially a decade: la musica degli anni Settanta.^[13][16][4]
7. (hyperbolic) A very long time: sono anni che non ci vediamo.^[13]

Word family

• annata
• annoso
• annetto
• capodanno
• malanno

Related words

• annuale
• annuo
• anniversario
• annali
• Latin annus

Usage notes

Common expressions are buon anno! (happy New Year), anno bisestile (leap year), anno luce (light year), anni di piombo (the years of terrorism, about 1969–1980) and anno santo (Holy Year, a Jubilee).^[16][14]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Pfister, Max; Schweickard, Wolfgang; Prifti, Elton (eds.) (1979–), Lessico Etimologico Italiano, Wiesbaden: Reichert; online at lei-digitale.it
3. ^ a b c d e f g Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
5. ^ a b c Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b c d e De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
7. ^ Buchi, Éva; Schweickard, Wolfgang, eds. (2008–), Dictionnaire Étymologique Roman (DÉRom), Nancy: ATILF, http://www.atilf.fr/DERom
8. ^ Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 212
9. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
10. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
11. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
12. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
13. ^ a b c d e f Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
14. ^ a b Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
15. ^ Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
16. ^ a b c d Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana