camino

Forms

camino m (plural camini)^[1] Tuscan has cammino for this word too, and Old Italian and northern texts have Old Italian camin and Old Italian chamino.^[2][3][4][5]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin camīnus (“hearth, furnace”), borrowed into Latin from Ancient Greek κάμινος (káminos, “oven, furnace”).^{[6][7][8][1][9]} DELI calls the Greek word pre-Indo-European or foreign, and DEI perhaps Mediterranean.^[6][10] The Latin word is attested from Cato in the 2nd century BC for a domestic hearth, and later also for a furnace and a natural cavern.^[5]

It survives in Vegliote camain, Friulian ciamìn, Romansh chamin, Old Occitan cami and Franco-Provençal chemin.^[5][7] In the rest of Gallo-Romance it was replaced by Late Latin camināta, which gave French cheminée, whence Spanish chimenea and Italian ciminiera.^[5][7] The Latin word also passed into Old High German chemīn and Slovene kamín.^[5]

The word is unrelated to cammino “way”, from Late Latin cammīnus of Celtic origin.^[11]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first record is the Liber Antichristi, a northern text of the third quarter of the 13th century, and DELI's is the plural camin in Giacomino da Verona in the second half of the century.^[4][6][5] The sense is a fireplace or a flue built against or into a wall.^[4][6]

Semantic evolution

In Old Italian the word named the fireplace, its hood and chimney-stack, a lime or alum kiln, and the eternal fire of hell.^[4] Franco Sacchetti tells of a July dinner with a fire burning in the hearth behind the guests as if it were January.^[12] The sense “chimney top” is recorded before 1556 in Aretino, and Tommaseo cites the Tuscan saying fuma come un camino (he smokes like a chimney).^[6][13]

Technical senses came later: a mountaineering chimney, a vertical cleft wide enough for a climber, in 1934, and the vent of a volcano in 1937.^[6] Industrial language uses it for the stack of a furnace, a ship or a locomotive.^[8][14]

Timeline

• 1250–1275 – The Liber Antichristi has the word.^[4]
• Second half of the 13th century – Giacomino da Verona uses the plural camin.^[6]
• 1550 – Caminetto is recorded in Cosimo Bartoli.^[6]
• Before 1556 – Pietro Aretino uses camino for a chimney top.^[6]
• 1846 – Caminiera (as camminiera) is recorded.^[6]
• 1934 – The mountaineering sense is recorded.^[6]
• 1937 – The volcanic sense is recorded in the Enciclopedia italiana.^[6]

Meanings

Noun

1. A fireplace: a raised hearth built against a wall or into it, under a hood that leads to the flue: sedere accanto al camino acceso.^[8][2][3][1]
2. A chimney or flue; the chimney pot on a roof.^[8][2][3][1]
3. The stack that draws and disperses the smoke of a furnace, ship or locomotive; a smokestack.^[8][2][15]
4. (geology) The vent of a volcano, through which magma rises; also a shaft in the roof of a karst cave.^[8][2][3]
5. (mountaineering) A chimney: a vertical cleft between rock walls wide enough for a climber.^[8][2][3]
6. (cooking) A paper funnel set into some dishes so that steam can escape while they bake.^[8][14]

Word family

• caminetto
• caminiera
• tiracamino

Related words

• ciminiera
• Latin camīnus
• French cheminée

Usage notes

Fumare come un camino means to smoke heavily.^[2][15] Camino is also an old variant of cammino “way, path”, a word of different origin.^[8][15][14]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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
3. ^ a b c d e Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
4. ^ a b c d e Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
5. ^ a b c d e f Pfister, Max; Schweickard, Wolfgang; Prifti, Elton (eds.) (1979–), Lessico Etimologico Italiano, Wiesbaden: Reichert; online at lei-digitale.it, p. 10, 113
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
7. ^ a b c Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
8. ^ 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
9. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 702
11. ^ Pfister, Max; Schweickard, Wolfgang; Prifti, Elton (eds.) (1979–), Lessico Etimologico Italiano, Wiesbaden: Reichert; online at lei-digitale.it, p. 10, 220
12. ^ Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
13. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
14. ^ a b c Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
15. ^ a b c Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli