disseccare

Forms

disseccare (first-person singular present dissécco, first-person singular past historic disseccài, past participle disseccàto, auxiliary avére)^[1] The less common diseccare is the older spelling.^[2][3][4] Old Italian forms include deseccare and Old Italian dessiccatu.^[5]

Etymology

DELI, Sabatini–Coletti, Zingarelli and Gabrielli form it from Italian dis- + seccare, with dis- as an intensive prefix.^{[6][3][7][8][9]} GRADIT also derives it from seccare but compares Late Latin dēsiccāre.^[10] Treccani and Wiktionary take it from that Latin verb, formed with dē- on Latin siccus (“dry”), which Treccani compares with French dessécher.^[11][1] DEI also compares the French verb, recorded from the 12th century.^[12]

The verb seccare is from secco, from siccus.^[13]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first record is in Andrea da Grosseto (Tuscan, 1268), in the sense “to make dry”.^[5][7] DELI's earliest date is for the figurative sense “to drain of vitality”, in Guittone before 1294.^[6][10]

Semantic evolution

Old Italian medicine used the verb for drying out the moist humours of a body or an organ, and in the figurative disseccare le ossa “to dry the bones”, to make wretched.^[5] Fra Giordano wrote in 1302–1305 that natural heat dries the humours of the body, and Dante in the Convivio that Mars dries and burns things.^[6][4] The reflexive “to dry up, wither” appears in 14th-century translations of the Gospels.^[6]

Catherine of Siena used it of sadness that dries up the soul, and Tommaseo notes a dialect sense, to wind up a business by withdrawing its capital and goods.^[14] Today the figurative reflexive is used of creative powers that run dry.^[7][8]

Timeline

• 1268 – Andrea da Grosseto uses the verb.^[5][7]
• Before 1294 – Guittone uses it figuratively.^[6][10]
• 1302–1305 – Fra Giordano da Pisa uses it of drying.^[6]
• 14th century – The reflexive appears in translations of the Gospels.^[6]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive) To dry out, make arid, desiccate: Il vento di scirocco disseccò l'orto in pochi giorni.^[10][2][7]
2. (transitive) To drain a pond or well.^[10][11]
3. (transitive, figurative) To exhaust, make sterile or lifeless.^[10][2][8]
4. (reflexive, disseccarsi) To dry up; figuratively, to run dry: Con gli anni la sua ispirazione si era disseccata.^[2][7][8]

Word family

• disseccamento
• disseccativo
• disseccato
• disseccazione

Related words

• seccare
• secco
• essiccare
• Latin dēsiccō

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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
3. ^ a b Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
4. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
5. ^ a b c d Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
6. ^ a b c d e f g 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 d e f Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
8. ^ a b c d Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
9. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier
10. ^ a b c d e f De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
11. ^ a b Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
12. ^ Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 1352
13. ^ Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
14. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET