fallire

Forms

fallire (first-person singular present fallìsco, first-person singular past historic fallìi, past participle fallìto, auxiliary avére or (in the meanings "to fail, to flop, to go bankrupt") èssere)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *fallīre, inherited from Latin fallō (“to deceive”) moved from the third conjugation to the fourth.^[2][3][1][4] In the passive the Latin verb meant “to be mistaken, to err”, which is the starting point of the Italian senses “to sin, to make a mistake”.^[5][6]

The same verb is French faillir, Occitan falhir and Old Spanish fallir.^[5][7] Modern Spanish uses fallecer for “to be lacking”, and keeps fallir only as a loan meaning “to go bankrupt”.^[7]

De Vaan derives Latin fallō from Proto-Indo-European *sgʷʰh₂(e)l- (“to stumble”), comparing Ancient Greek σφάλλω (sphállō, “to bring down”) and Sanskrit स्खलते (skhalate, “stumbles, fails”): the Latin sense would have moved from “to make stumble” to “to deceive”.^[8] Nocentini also compares Old High German fallan (“to fall”), and Devoto calls the image one of the metaphors taken from the difficulties of walking, as in peccato.^[5][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first record is the Ritmo di Sant'Alessio, a poem from the Marche of the late 12th century.^[9] DELI's first dated sense is “to commit a fault or an error”, in Bonagiunta Orbicciani in the 13th century, who writes that a man who does not fall in love fallisce troppo, “errs greatly”.^[2][10]

Semantic evolution

The religious sense “to sin” and the sense “not to succeed in an aim” (before 1294, Guittone d'Arezzo) are the oldest;^[2][3] Brunetto Latini also used the verb for “to diminish, give out”, as Dante's li fallìa la lena, “his breath failed him”.^[2][3] The transitive sense “to miss a blow or a target” is recorded in 1304 in Giordano da Pisa.^[2]

The commercial sense “to go bankrupt” appears before 1348 in Giovanni Villani, and the verb spread in this sense through the trading cities: German borrowed it as fallieren in 1548.^[2][11] The GDLI notes this double spread, religious and legal.^[10] The infinitive was also used as a noun, il fallire, “a fault, a sin”, in poets from Guittone to Michelangelo;^[12][13] Petrarch wrote ’n giovenil fallir è men vergogna.^[12][13] Today the verb means above all “to fail” and “to go bankrupt”; the senses “to sin” and “to deceive” are archaic.^[3][14]

Timeline

• Late 12th century – The Ritmo di Sant'Alessio is the TLIO's first record.^[9]
• 13th century – Bonagiunta uses the verb for “to err, sin”.^[2]
• Before 1294 – Guittone d'Arezzo uses it for “not to succeed”.^[2]
• 1304 – Giordano da Pisa uses it for “to miss (a blow)”.^[2]
• Before 1348 – Giovanni Villani uses it for “to go bankrupt”, and fallito for a bankrupt.^[2]
• 1548 – German fallieren “to go bankrupt” is recorded.^[11]
• 1918 – Fallimentare “of bankruptcy” is recorded.^[2]

Meanings

Verb

1. (intransitive, of a person; auxiliary avere) To fail, not to succeed in what one attempts: Ho fallito due volte prima di riuscirci.^[3][14][15]
2. (intransitive, of a thing; auxiliary essere) To come to nothing, have a negative outcome: Il piano di salvataggio è fallito.^[3][14][15]
3. (intransitive, auxiliary essere) To go bankrupt: Il negozio sotto casa è fallito.^[3][14][6]
4. (literary) To fall short of, not keep: fallire a un impegno.^[14][15][6]
5. (transitive) To miss a target or a ball: fallire il colpo, fallire la porta in football.^[3][14][16]
6. (archaic) To sin, commit a fault, and transitively to deceive.^[3][16][6]

Word family

• fallito
• fallimento
• fallimentare
• fallibile
• fallibilità
• infallibile

Related words

• fallabile
• fallare
• fallo
• falso
• French faillir

Usage notes

With a person as subject the auxiliary is avere (ha fallito), with a thing or a firm as subject essere (la ditta è fallita).^[16][14] The past participle fallito is also an adjective and a noun: “failed” and “a failure, a bankrupt”.^[2][6]

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
3. ^ 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
4. ^ a b Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier
5. ^ a b c Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b c d e Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
7. ^ a b Körting, Gustav (1907), Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch: etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Hauptsprachen, 3rd ed., Paderborn: Schöningh
8. ^ 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 Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
10. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 5
11. ^ a b Stammerjohann, Harro, et al. (2008), Dizionario di italianismi in francese, inglese, tedesco, Firenze: Accademia della Crusca; online at difit.italianisticaonline.it
12. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 5, 602
13. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
14. ^ a b c d e f g Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
15. ^ a b c Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
16. ^ a b c Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli