domandare

Forms

domandare (first-person singular present domàndo, first-person singular past historic domandài, past participle domandàto, auxiliary avére)^[1] The older and Tuscan form dimandare is now literary.^[2][3][4] Old texts also have Old Italian demandare.^[5]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin dēmandō (“to entrust, commend”), formed with dē- and mandō (“to entrust”).^[6][7][8][1] The Latin verb meant “entrust” and “commend”, then “send to find out” and so “ask”.^[6][4] Except in Romanian, this sense “ask” spread through all of Romance: French demander, Occitan demandar, Catalan demanar, Spanish demandar and Portuguese demandar, while the Aromanian verb means “to order”.^[7][9]

The /o/ before the stress comes from the labial /m/ that follows, as in domani, dovere and dovizia.^[7][6][10] Devoto and Körting also see the influence of comandare.^[10][11] DELI, following Vitale, notes that the variants had a social value: dimandare, alternating with demandare, was the ordinary Florentine form, while the form with /o/ sounded more popular.^[6] The modern verb “to entrust, refer” is a borrowed doublet of the same Latin verb.^[1][11]

The OLD explains the simple verb as a compound of Latin manus (“hand”) and the verbal element seen in abdō (“to put away”).^[12]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI's first record is the sense “ask in order to obtain” in the Breve di Montieri of 1219.^[6][8] The sense “ask in order to know” appears in the early 13th century as dimandare in Giacomino Pugliese, and as domandare in Dante in 1293–94.^[6][5]

Semantic evolution

Old Italian used the verb also for “command”, as in Cavalca, and si domanda for “is called”, as in Cellini.^[13] Dante has the intransitive sense “ask after a person”.^[6] The noun domanda followed, first as dimanda in Guittone (before 1294), and in the 17th century took the economic sense “demand”, the quantity of a good that buyers ask for, in F. Carletti.^[6]

Modern Italian keeps both senses side by side, asking for information and asking for something to be given, and adds “require” of things (un lavoro che domanda pazienza).^[8][3] The exclamation domando e dico! expresses amazement or indignation, and a proverb says domandare è lecito, rispondere è cortesia (“asking is allowed, answering is a courtesy”).^[8][14][2]

Timeline

• 1219 – The Breve di Montieri has the verb in the sense “ask for”.^[6]
• Early 13th century – Giacomino Pugliese writes dimandare “ask”.^[6]
• Before 1294 – Guittone uses the noun dimanda.^[6]
• 1293–1294 – Dante uses the form domandare.^[6]
• Before 1442 – The noun form domanda appears in Rinaldo degli Albizzi.^[6]
• Before 1636 – Domanda in the economic sense “demand” appears in F. Carletti.^[6]

Meanings

Verb

1. To ask a question in order to find something out: gli ho domandato a che ora parte il treno.^[8][4][1]
2. To ask for something one wants to obtain; to request: domandare un permesso, domandare scusa.^[8][2][1]
3. To ask as a price or fee: quanto domanda per la bicicletta?^[8]
4. Of things, to require, call for: un restauro che domanda molta cura.^[8]
5. (reflexive, domandarsi) To wonder, ask oneself.^[14][15]
6. (intransitive) To ask after someone or something: domandare di un amico.^[6][3]

Word family

• domanda
• ridomandare
• domandatore
• domandamento

Related words

• comandare
• mandare
• demandare
• French demander
• Latin dēmandō

Usage notes

Domandare and chiedere are synonyms.^[1][4] The noun domanda means both “question” and “request; application”.^[6]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g 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 Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
4. ^ a b c d Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
5. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p 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 De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
9. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
10. ^ a b Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier
11. ^ a b Körting, Gustav (1907), Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch: etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Hauptsprachen, 3rd ed., Paderborn: Schöningh
12. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
13. ^ Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 388
14. ^ a b Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
15. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli