doglio

Forms

doglio m (plural dogli)^[1] Northern dialects have Piedmontese duia “jug”, Friulian doia and Genoese duga.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin dōlium (“large earthenware jar”).^[4][5][6][1] Sabatini–Coletti calls it the popular form beside the learned dolio.^[7][5] The same Latin word gave French douil (“grape tub”), Old Occitan dolh and Catalan doll (“large oil jar”).^[5][3]

DELI and GRADIT call the origin of the Latin word uncertain.^[4][6] Pokorny took it from Proto-Indo-European *delh₁- (“to cut”), the root of dolō (“to hew”), but that verb is used of woodwork, not of pottery, and the long vowel of the Latin noun cannot be explained regularly.^[8][1] De Vaan and Nocentini compare Old Irish delb (“form”) and Slavic words for a barrel or clay pot, and de Vaan suggests that a pottery term may be a loanword.^[8][5] John Pairman Brown proposed a Punic trade word.^[1]

The zoological sense comes from the genus name Dolium, given to the mollusc for the shape of its shell.^[7][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first record is a Savona document of 1178–82, for a large vessel for wine, oil or grain.^[10] DELI's first Italian date is the translation of Crescenzi, around 1350, and Nocentini and GRADIT have it before 1320.^[4][5][6]

Semantic evolution

Boccaccio has a customer say “Il doglio mi par ben saldo”, the jar seems sound to me.^[11] The doglio was a wooden or clay vessel shaped like a large barrel, with a hole below for drawing the wine or vinegar.^[11] DEI dates the diminutive doglietto to the 15th century.^[2]

In later Italian the word belongs to archaeology: the great round jar of the Greeks and Romans, and the tombe a doglio of early Italy, in which such a vessel held a cinerary urn.^[6][12] In poetry it means any jar or cask, as in Pascoli's “il fumeo doglio”.^[6] Leopardi's “doglio avaro” recalls the two jars of Zeus in Homer, one of good things and one of ills.^[12][7] The name of the mollusc dates from 1875.^[7]

Timeline

• 1178–1182 – A Savona document has the first record.^[10]
• Before 1320 – Nocentini's and GRADIT's date for the Italian word.^[5][6]
• c. 1350 – The Italian Crescenzi uses it for a storage jar.^[4]
• 1400s – The diminutive doglietto is recorded.^[2]
• 1875 – The name of the mollusc is first recorded.^[7]

Meanings

Noun

1. (archaeology, history) A large round earthenware jar in which the Greeks and Romans stored wine, oil or grain, a dolium.^[6][9][13]
2. (literary) A jar, cask or barrel.^[6][9][14]
3. (zoology) The giant tun, a large Mediterranean sea snail, Tonna galea.^[6][9][13]

Word family

• doglietto

Related words

• dolio
• Latin dōlium

Usage notes

An archaic and rare doglio “pain”, from Late Latin cordolium and related to doglia, is found in Bonagiunta Orbicciani in the mid-13th century.^[15][10]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 1373
3. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
4. ^ a b c d Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
5. ^ a b c d e f Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
6. ^ 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
7. ^ a b c d e Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
8. ^ 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
9. ^ 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
10. ^ a b c Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
11. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
12. ^ a b Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
13. ^ a b Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
14. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
15. ^ Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca