appartamento

Forms

appartamento m (plural appartamenti)^[1] The first record has the form apartamento, with a single ⟨p⟩.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Old Spanish apartamiento (“secluded place”), a noun formed on apartar (“to set apart”) and aparte (“apart”), and was adapted to the Italian verb appartare.^[2][4][5][1] GRADIT dates the Spanish word to 1493–1495.^[5] The Spanish words go back to Latin pars (“part”), the source of parte.^[4][6]

Italian passed the word on as French appartement (1559), and modern Spanish borrowed it back as Spanish apartamento.^[6][7][1] The GDLI notes that the Italian word appears in the 16th century together with that verb.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI's first record is Paolo Giovio in 1538, with the form apartamento and the sense “the set of rooms that form a dwelling”.^[2][9]

Semantic evolution

In the 16th century the word was used for a group of rooms reserved for one person or one use within a great house or palace: Vasari writes of halls and rooms below that make up an appartamento for the summer.^[8][10] Torquato Tasso remarked that French houses had no suite of rooms in a convenient forma d'appartamento.^[8] The word then came to mean a dwelling within a larger building, the ordinary sense today, and in luxury hotels a suite.^[5][11][12]

In royal palaces gli appartamenti are the private rooms of a member of the family, and ritirarsi nei propri appartamenti is used jokingly of anyone who withdraws.^[5][13] In French appartement also meant a court reception from 1851 to 1862.^[7]

Timeline

• 1493–1495 – Spanish apartamiento is recorded.^[5]
• 1538 – Paolo Giovio uses apartamento.^[2]
• 1559 – French appartement is first recorded.^[7]
• 16th century – Vasari and Tasso use appartamento for a suite of rooms.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. A flat, apartment: a dwelling of several rooms within a larger building: Hanno comprato un appartamento al terzo piano.^{[5][11][3][1]}
2. In a hotel, a suite of rooms.^[5][11][12]
3. In a royal or princely palace, the private rooms of one member of the family: gli appartamenti della regina.^[5][11][13]

Word family

• appartamentino

Related words

• parte
• appartare
• Spanish apartamento
• French appartement

Usage notes

Pianta da appartamento is a houseplant, and topo d'appartamento (literally “flat mouse”) a burglar.^[5] Old Neapolitan had an unrelated noun appardamiento, from appartare, meaning “withdrawing (to be alone)”, in the 14th-century Destructione de Troya.^[14] A nautical appartamento, the distance a ship makes east or west on a course oblique to the meridians, also comes from Spanish apartamiento in the sense “moving away”.^[13][9][12]

References

1. ^ a b c d e 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. ^ a b Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
4. ^ a b Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
6. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
7. ^ a b c Stammerjohann, Harro, et al. (2008), Dizionario di italianismi in francese, inglese, tedesco, Firenze: Accademia della Crusca; online at difit.italianisticaonline.it
8. ^ a b c d Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 1, 554
9. ^ a b Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
10. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
11. ^ a b c d Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
12. ^ a b c Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
13. ^ a b c Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
14. ^ Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it