bollire

Forms

bollire (first-person singular present bóllo, first-person singular past historic bollìi, past participle bollìto, auxiliary avére)^[1] Tuscan also has boglire.^[2][3] Old Italian forms include bolire and bogliente.^[4][5]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin bulliō (“to bubble, boil”), a verb recorded in Vitruvius and formed from bulla (“bubble”); literally it meant “to make bubbles”, “to go bul-bul”.^{[5][6][7][2][1]} Devoto traces it to an imitative series of the shape b…l….^[8] In Latin it took over the place and senses of ferveō (“to boil”),^[5][9] which survives in Romanian, in Ibero-Romance and in southern Italy outside Sicily.^[10]

The same verb is French bouillir, Occitan bulhir, Portuguese bolir, Spanish bullir and Sardinian buddire.^{[6][11][12][10]}

Forms with /ʎʎ/, such as Old Italian bogliente and Tuscan boglire, were remade on Old Italian boglio, the regular outcome of the Latin first person singular.^[5][9] The LEI also records dialect types that moved to the second or first conjugation, such as bollere and bugliare.^[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI's first record is figurative: in Giamboni, before 1292, the sea “boils”, that is, it is in great agitation.^[5][10] The TLIO's first record is in the Milanese poems of Bonvesin, from the late 13th century.^[4] Dante uses it for a liquid bubbling and for cooking in a boiling liquid: bolle l'inverno la tenace pece (“in winter the sticky pitch boils”, Inferno 21).^[5][13]

Semantic evolution

In Old Italian the verb was said of liquids and of the pots holding them, of the sea and of a restless crowd, of something cooked in water, of must fermenting, of the torments of hell, and of strong passions such as anger.^[4] The transitive use, “to cook in a boiling liquid”, is recorded about 1350 in the Italian translation of Crescenzi.^[5]

Of its derivatives, bollore “boiling” goes back to Dante and bollito “boiled” to Iacopone;^[5][14] bollito as a noun for boiled meat (before 1601) copies French bouilli.^[5][14] The phrase bollenti spiriti spread with the libretto of Verdi's La traviata (1853).^[5] Modern figurative uses include qualcosa bolle in pentola, something is being prepared in secret, and il sangue gli bolle nelle vene, of a hot-tempered person.^[2][7][15]

Timeline

• Before 1292 – Giamboni uses bollire of a stormy sea.^[5][10]
• 1300–1313 – Dante uses the verb of bubbling pitch and has the participle bogliente.^[5]
• Before 1306 – Bollito “boiled” appears in Iacopone.^[5]
• c. 1350 – The transitive sense “to cook in boiling liquid” appears.^[5]
• Before 1601 – Bollito is used as a noun for boiled meat.^[5]
• 1853 – La traviata popularizes bollenti spiriti.^[5]
• 1922 – Bollitore is recorded for a vessel for boiling liquids.^[5]
• 1960 – Ribollita, the Tuscan soup, is first recorded.^[6]

Meanings

Verb

1. (intransitive) Of a liquid, to boil: to reach the temperature at which bubbles of vapour form and rise to the surface: Quando l'acqua bolle, aggiungi il sale.^{[7][16][3][2]}
2. (intransitive) Of food, to cook in boiling water; of a pot, to hold a boiling liquid.^[7][16][3]
3. (intransitive) Of must, to ferment.^[7][16][2]
4. (intransitive, figurative) To be extremely hot, to swelter: In questa cucina si bolle.^[7][16][2]
5. (intransitive, figurative) To seethe with a strong feeling held in check: bollire di rabbia.^{[7][16][2][17]}
6. (transitive) To bring a liquid to the boil; to cook food in boiling water (synonym lessare).^{[7][16][3][1]}

Word family

• bollente
• bollore
• bollito
• bollitore
• bollitura
• bollilatte
• ribollire
• ribollita
• ribollimento
• sbollire
• sbollentare

Related words

• bolla
• ebollizione
• bulicame
• Latin bulliō
• French bouillir

Usage notes

The auxiliary is avere.^[16][1] Bolli bolli was an old word for an uproar or tumult.^[14][7]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
3. ^ a b c d Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
4. ^ a b c Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
6. ^ a b c Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
7. ^ 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
8. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier
9. ^ a b Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 553
10. ^ a b c d e Pfister, Max; Schweickard, Wolfgang; Prifti, Elton (eds.) (1979–), Lessico Etimologico Italiano, Wiesbaden: Reichert; online at lei-digitale.it, p. 8, 37
11. ^ Körting, Gustav (1907), Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch: etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Hauptsprachen, 3rd ed., Paderborn: Schöningh
12. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
13. ^ Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
14. ^ a b c Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 158
15. ^ Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
16. ^ 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
17. ^ Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana