città

Forms

città f (invariable)^[1] Old and literary forms include Old Italian cittade and Old Italian cittate.^[2][3][4] The GDLI also records the old literary Old Italian civita and Old Italian civitate.^[5] Northern dialects have forms such as Piedmontese sità in Piedmont and Emilian zità at Parma.^[6]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin cīvitās (“citizenship; the citizens; city”) (in Italian from its accusative case), a derivative of cīvis (“citizen”) with the suffix -tās.^{[7][8][9][10][1]} DELI traces the Latin noun for “citizen” to an Indo-European root meaning “to settle”.^[7] The modern form comes from Old Italian cittade by the loss of the final syllable, and the derivatives such as cittadino were formed on that longer form.^[7][3][8]

The word is shared by the Romance languages: French cité, Occitan ciutat, Catalan ciutat, Spanish ciudad, Portuguese cidade and Romanian cetate (“fortress”).^[8][11] In Latin it first meant the condition of being a citizen, then the body of citizens and the seat of a government, and in the end it displaced urbs (“city”) as the ordinary word for a town.^[12][13]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI's first record is the form civitate in the Ritmo di Sant'Alessio at the end of the 12th century, and the form città about 1225, in Garzo.^[7] The GDLI quotes the Ritmo: “Era questa una civitate de Syria” (This was a city of Syria).^[5] The TLIO's earliest text is the Cremonese Libro of Uguccione da Lodi, from the early 13th century, where the word means a large, walled town ruled by a central power.^[14]

Semantic evolution

Already in Old Italian the word also meant the body of citizens, the community and its laws, one's homeland, and in religious language Paradise, the city of the blessed.^[14][11] Tommaseo observed that early writers, Dante among them, also used terra and villa for a town.^[15] Today the word names any large town, the municipality as an administrative body, and a district with a character of its own, such as the città vecchia or città alta.^[9][4]

Many set phrases name particular cities: the città eterna is Rome, the città della Madonnina Milan, the città del Giglio Florence and the città santa Jerusalem.^[16][17][4] Città aperta, an undefended city that the belligerents agree not to attack, dates from the 20th century.^[12][18] Città dei ragazzi, a community for homeless boys, is a calque of English Boys Town, the village that Father Edward Flanagan founded in Nebraska and that a film made famous.^[7] DELI also notes the political meaning that cittadino “citizen” took on after the French Revolution.^[7]

Timeline

• Late 12th century – Civitate appears in the Ritmo di Sant'Alessio.^[7]
• About 1225 – The form città is recorded, in Garzo.^[7]
• 1266 – Cittadino “citizen” is recorded, perhaps in Guidotto da Bologna.^[7]
• Before 1321 – Dante uses cittadinanza for the body of citizens.^[7]
• Before 1363 – Matteo Villani uses cittadella, a city's fortress.^[7]
• 20th century – Città aperta “open city” is recorded.^[12]

Meanings

Noun

1. A city or large town, a centre of economic, administrative and cultural life: Dopo vent'anni in campagna è tornata a vivere in città.^[9][2][3][1]
2. With di and a place name, especially in official use: the municipality as an administrative body.^[9]
3. A title held by towns of historic standing, even small ones.^[9][3]
4. A part of a city with its own character: città vecchia, città alta.^[9][4]
5. The inhabitants of a city, the citizens: Quella sera tutta la città scese in piazza.^[9][3][4]

Word family

• cittadella
• cittadinanza
• cittadino
• cittadina
• concittadino
• stracittadino

Related words

• civile
• civico
• civiltà
• Latin cīvitās
• French cité
• English city

Usage notes

Città is feminine and invariable: la città, le città.^[1][2][9] The stress falls on the final syllable, which is why it is written with an accent.^[1][3]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c 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 f Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
4. ^ a b c d e Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
5. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 3, 200
6. ^ Pfister, Max; Schweickard, Wolfgang; Prifti, Elton (eds.) (1979–), Lessico Etimologico Italiano, Wiesbaden: Reichert; online at lei-digitale.it, p. 14, 929
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
8. ^ a b c Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
9. ^ a b c d e f g h De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
10. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ a b Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975)
12. ^ a b c Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 968
13. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
14. ^ a b Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
15. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET, p. 1, 1456
16. ^ Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
17. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
18. ^ Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca