annoiare

Forms

annoiare (first-person singular present annòio, first-person singular past historic annoiài, past participle annoiàto, auxiliary avére)^[1]

Etymology

Most dictionaries take it as borrowed from Old Occitan enojar (“to vex, irritate”).^{[2][3][4][5][6][7]} Wiktionary names Old French anoier as the source instead.^[1] DELI and Zingarelli derive it directly from Late Latin inodiāre.^[8][9] Either way the starting point is that Late Latin verb, recorded in the Tironian Notes and in African inscriptions.^[10]

The Late Latin verb was formed from the phrase in odiō habēre, “to hold in hatred”.^[8][2][5] The Occitan verb also gave Catalan enujar, Spanish enojar and Portuguese enojar, and the Late Latin one is the source of French ennuyer.^[2] Italian noia has the same Occitan origin.^[2][3] Sabatini–Coletti explains the spelling with ⟨ann-⟩ for Occitan ⟨en-⟩ by analogy with the verbs that began with Latin ad-.^[5]

The word for “hatred” in that phrase belongs with Latin ōdī (“I hate”), which de Vaan traces to a perfect Proto-Indo-European *h₃e-h₃(o)d- (“to hate”).^[11]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in Guittone, before 1294, in Tuscan.^[12][9] The Old Italian senses were “to trouble, bother”, also of the torment of an illness, “to weary with something long and monotonous”, and “to grieve, afflict”.^[12]

Semantic evolution

Old Italian also had a pronominal use meaning “to be unwelcome, displease”.^[12] DELI's first record is Petrarch, before 1374.^[8] His line il morir mio che sì t’annoia (“my death, which so grieves you”) shows the sense of distress, which the modern dictionaries mark as archaic.^[3][4][6]

The GDLI, where the sense of tedium has won out, defines the verb as to oppress with boredom and the pronominal annoiarsi as to feel bored, to languish idle without knowing how to spend one's time.^[13] Goldoni writes Se il soggiorno di questa casa vi annoia (“If staying in this house bores you”).^[13] Zingarelli still records a literary sense “to give pain, anguish”, with an example from Manzoni.^[9]

Timeline

• Before 1294 – Guittone uses the verb, its first record.^[12][9]
• Before 1374 – Petrarch uses it of grief: il morir mio che sì t’annoia.^[8][3]

Meanings

Verb

1. To bore or weary; to annoy someone with something tedious or repeated: Quel professore annoia tutta la classe.^[3][4][5][1]
2. (archaic) To grieve, afflict.^[3][4][6]
3. (obsolete, intransitive) To be troublesome.^[9]
4. (pronominal, annoiarsi) To get bored, grow tired (of something: di): Mi annoio sempre ai matrimoni.^[4][5][6]

Word family

• annoiamento
• annoiato
• annoiatore
• riannoiare

Related words

• noia
• French ennuyer
• English annoy

Usage notes

An older spelling is annojare.^[1] The GDLI records a separate disused annoiare “to hire out”, derived from nolo “hire”, from the laws of Tuscany.^[13]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
3. ^ a b c d e f De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
4. ^ a b c d e 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 Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
6. ^ a b c d Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
7. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier
8. ^ 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
9. ^ a b c d e Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
10. ^ Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 212
11. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
12. ^ a b c d Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
13. ^ a b c Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca