Etymologically
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bottiglia

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Pronunciation

  • /botˈtiʎ.ʎa/[1]

Forms

bottiglia f (plural bottiglie)[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French bouteille, from Late Latin butticula (“small cask”), a diminutive of buttis (“cask”), the source of botte.[2][3][4][5][6][7][8] Nocentini reconstructs Vulgar Latin *bŭttīcŭla with a long /iː/.[9] The Latin word is recorded as buticula in an early medieval medical text and in Carolingian charters, as puticla in the Kassel Glosses, and as botilia in an 8th-century parody of the Salic Law.[9][10][2][1] The Gallo-Romance forms, Old French botaille and Old Occitan botelha, need a short /i/, while those of Italy and Spain, such as Spanish botija (“earthenware jar”), need a long one;[10][9] Nocentini explains the Florentine stress on the /i/ by a change of suffix.[10][9] The word first meant a wooden vessel; the sense “glass bottle” arose in northern France and spread from there in the late Middle Ages.[10][8] From French also came Spanish botella, Portuguese botelha and English bottle.[9][8][7]

Zaccaria derived the Italian word from Spanish botilla (“wine flask”) instead, and Devoto and Treccani follow him;[2][11][12][13] DELI thinks a direct Spanish influence cannot be ruled out, while Prati rejected it.[2][11][12][13]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first record is a Tuscan document of 1362–1365, with the form botiglie, for a cylindrical vessel holding liquids.[14] DELI starts from Annibal Caro, before 1566: “Come on, champions of beds and bottles” (Or via, campioni / da letti e da bottiglie).[2][15][16] The derivative bottigliere “cellarer, butler”, from French bouteiller, is older, from the 14th century.[2][9]

Semantic evolution

Florio's dictionary of 1598 has both botteglia and bottiglia, and Scipione Maffei still wrote botteglie in 1747, with the vowel of the French model.[2] Bottiglione is in Florio (1598), and bottiglieria meant a wine cellar in Vasari (1550) before it became a shop selling wine and spirits (1818).[2] From the vessel the word passed to its contents, as in Parini's l'Ongarese bottiglia, the bottle of Hungarian wine.[16][15]

Modern phrases include bottiglia Molotov (1950), verde bottiglia “bottle green”, and collo di bottiglia, a narrowing of a road and, translating English bottleneck, an obstacle in production.[2][12][4] Italian bottiglia was borrowed into Greek, Albanian and Serbo-Croatian.[1]

Timeline

  • 8th century – Latin botilia appears in a parody of the Salic Law.[2][10]
  • 14th century – Bottigliere is recorded.[2]
  • 1362–1365 – A Tuscan document has botiglie.[14]
  • 1550 – Vasari uses bottiglieria for a wine cellar.[2]
  • Before 1566 – Annibal Caro uses bottiglie.[2]
  • 1598 – Florio records botteglia, bottiglia and bottiglione.[2]
  • 1818 – Bottiglieria is recorded as a wine shop.[2]
  • 1950 – Bottiglia Molotov is recorded.[2]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A bottle: a container of glass, plastic or other material, usually cylindrical with a narrow neck, for liquids: Ricordati di mettere in frigo una bottiglia d'acqua frizzante.[3][4][5]
  2. The contents of a bottle: In quattro abbiamo finito due bottiglie di rosso.[3][5][17]
  3. (physics, chemistry) A vessel of various shapes used in science: bottiglia di Leida, the Leyden jar.[4][17][12]
  4. (invariable, after a noun) In verde bottiglia: bottle green.[4][5][17]

Word family

  • bottigliata
  • bottigliera
  • bottigliere
  • bottiglieria
  • bottiglione
  • imbottigliare
  • imbottigliamento
  • sottobottiglia
  • bottiglietta

References

  1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
  3. ^ a b c 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 Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
  6. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
  7. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
  8. ^ a b c Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 576
  9. ^ a b c d e f Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
  10. ^ a b c d e Pfister, Max; Schweickard, Wolfgang; Prifti, Elton (eds.) (1979–), Lessico Etimologico Italiano, Wiesbaden: Reichert; online at lei-digitale.it
  11. ^ a b Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier
  12. ^ a b c d Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
  13. ^ a b Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti
  14. ^ a b Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
  15. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
  16. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
  17. ^ a b c Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli