coltello

Forms

coltello m (plural coltelli, diminutive coltellìno or (rare) coltellétto, augmentative coltellóne, pejorative coltellàccio, derogatory coltellùccio)^[1] Old Italian had the plurals coltegli and coltella (feminine) beside coltelli, and the forms cortello, cultello and coltiello.^[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin cultellus (“small knife”), the diminutive of culter (“knife”).^[5][6][7][1] When “culter” came to mean the blade of the plough and the plough itself (the source of coltro), the diminutive took over the sense “knife”.^[6] The word is found in all the Romance languages except Romanian: French couteau, Occitan coltel, Catalan coltell, Spanish cuchillo, Portuguese cutelo, Venetian cortelo and Dalmatian kortial.^[6][8][9] The forms with ⟨r⟩, such as Old Italian cortello and Calabrian “curteddu”, go back to a dissimilated Vulgar Latin *curtellus; a form *cuntellus survives in Agnone, Romansh and Catalan.^[9][8]

Two explanations are given for “culter”.^[6][10] Nocentini derives it from “*kertro-”, an instrument noun from Proto-Indo-European *(s)ker- (“to cut”), with the first ⟨r⟩ dissimilated to ⟨l⟩.^[6] De Vaan prefers Proto-Indo-European *(s)kelh₂/₃- (“to split, cleave”), with “*(s)kolh₂/₃-tro-” “instrument for cleaving”, since the dissimilation is an extra assumption.^[6][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI's first record is from 1233–1243, in the Sienese Matasalà di Spinello, of a cutting tool with a steel blade fixed in a handle, sharp on one edge.^[5] The TLIO's first record is in the Venetian Proverbia que dicuntur super natura feminarum.^[2] Brunetto Latini warns that if you have a knife, someone else has a good one too.^[3]

Semantic evolution

In Old Italian the coltello was both a tool and a weapon, a short dagger or sword: the TLIO records coltello da lato, a dagger worn at the side, and Iacopone and Boccaccio use it of a blade drawn in a quarrel or used to kill.^[2][3][11] Old phrases include leccare il coltello “to lick the knife”, to be extremely poor, and avere il miele in bocca e il coltello in mano “honey in the mouth and a knife in the hand”, of a false friend.^[2]

Derivatives followed early: coltellino (1285–1286), coltellaccio (Medieval Latin cultellazum at Bologna, 1252), coltellata, a knife wound (1302–1305), and accoltellare “to stab” (around 1300).^[5][6] Coltellaccio also became the name of a light sail set beside the square sails (1729), and passed into French as coutelas.^[5][8] The modern idioms are avere il coltello dalla parte del manico “to hold the knife by the handle”, to have the upper hand, and avere il coltello alla gola “to have the knife at one's throat”, to be in desperate straits; fog or tension “that can be cut with a knife” is very thick.^[7][12][13]

Timeline

• 1233–1243 – Matasalà di Spinello uses coltello.^[5]
• 1252 – Medieval Latin cultellazum is recorded at Bologna.^[5]
• 1285–1286 – Coltellino is recorded.^[6]
• 1302–1305 – Giordano da Pisa uses coltellata.^[5]
• 15th century – Coltellinaio, a maker or seller of knives, appears in the carnival songs.^[5]
• 1729 – Coltellaccio is recorded as the name of a sail.^[5]
• 1880 – Coltelleria is recorded.^[5]

Meanings

Noun

1. knife: a tool with a sharp blade fixed in a handle, used for cutting or as a weapon: Passami il coltello per il pane.^[7][12][14]
2. A tool or device shaped like a knife or used for cutting: the coulter of a plough (coltello dell'aratro), the knife edge on which the beam of a balance rests (coltello della bilancia).^[14][13]
3. (figurative) Violence, armed fighting: lotta a coltello “a fight to the death”.^[12][13]

Word family

• coltellino
• coltellaccio
• coltellata
• coltelleria
• coltellinaio
• coltella
• accoltellare
• accoltellamento
• coltelliera

Related words

• coltro
• cultro
• Latin culter
• French couteau

Usage notes

A coltello describes bricks laid on edge in a wall.^[12][13] Common combinations are coltello da cucina, da tavola and a serramanico (kitchen knife, table knife, folding knife).^[4][15]

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
3. ^ a b c Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
4. ^ a b Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j 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 d e f g h Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
7. ^ a b c De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
8. ^ a b c Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
9. ^ a b Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 1023
10. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
11. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
12. ^ 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
13. ^ a b c d Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
14. ^ a b Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
15. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli