faloppa

Forms

faloppa f (plural faloppe)^[1] A less common spelling is falloppa.^[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Late Latin faluppa (“chip, wisp of straw”), a word known from the glosses, where it explains tiny bits of chaff, straw and twigs.^[5][6][7][1] DEI places the Late Latin word in the 10th century, in northern Italy and France, and calls its origin unknown.^[8] In Italian the word is northern at first, and it later reached the southern dialects too.^[8] DELI does not name the gloss word: it cites Medieval Latin falopla from Bologna (1260) and Modena (13th century).^[9]

DELI thinks it probably pre-Indo-European, and Devoto saw it as an Alpine word of pre-Indo-European origin.^[9][10] Nocentini instead derives it from Greek: it would be an adaptation of the accusative of Ancient Greek πομφόλυγα (pomphóluga, “air bubble, pustule”), a form parallel to fanfaluca, with the doubled first syllable simplified and the ending changed.^[5] For Nocentini the sense of a hollow, worthless thing fits a bubble, and Venetian falòpa “tall tale, braggart” has the same basic senses as fanfaluga, while its senses “empty cocoon” and “silk waste” must be secondary.^[5] DEI tentatively compares falasco.^[8]

Nocentini also traces falpalà and felpa to the Late Latin word.^[5] Meyer-Lübke listed under it northern Italian words for twigs and foliage and the family of frappa and frappare.^[11] Körting reported Horning's attempt to derive further Romance words from it, among them French envelopper and frapper, and judged the whole construction unsound.^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Before any Italian text, Medieval Latin documents of Bologna (1260) and Modena (13th century) record the word as falopla.^[9] The first Italian record is in the 14th-century statutes of the Florentine silk guild, the Statuti dell'Arte della seta, which list faloppe among silk waste beside rags of silk and pierced cocoons: a silkworm cocoon left soft and irregular because the larva inside it died.^[9][12]

Semantic evolution

Besides the spoiled cocoon the word came to mean the poor silk reeled from such cocoons, also called terzanella.^[6][13][14] Statutes of the merchants' court of Lucca and the naturalist Targioni Tozzetti use it of the same waste.^[12]

In the 19th century the empty cocoon gave a figurative sense, a vain person who boasts and tells lies; the Crusca defines it as “a vain, conceited, boastful man”.^[8][12] The augmentative faloppone dates from the same century;^[8][12] Tommaseo explains it as one who stuffs his speech or writing with padding.^[8][12] Referring to a man, the noun can be used as an invariable masculine.^[4][13]

Timeline

• 1260 – Medieval Latin falopla is recorded at Bologna.^[9]
• 1300s – Faloppa appears in the statutes of the silk guild.^[9][12]
• 1800s – The figurative sense “braggart, liar” and the augmentative faloppone appear.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. (zootechnics) A silkworm cocoon of poor quality, left soft and incomplete because the larva died inside it.^[6][2][13]
2. Poor-quality silk obtained from such cocoons; terzanella.^[6][13][14]
3. (figurative, dated) A liar or braggart, a vain person; also masculine.^[6][2][4]

Word family

• faloppone
• faloppato

Related words

• fanfaluca
• falpalà
• felpa
• frappa
• Late Latin faluppa

Usage notes

Mattioli's commentary on Dioscorides records a dialect faloppa “seahorse” used by the fishermen of Aquileia and Grado, of uncertain origin.^[12]

References

1. ^ a b 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. ^ Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
4. ^ a b c Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
5. ^ a b c d Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b c d e De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
7. ^ a b Körting, Gustav (1907), Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch: etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Hauptsprachen, 3rd ed., Paderborn: Schöningh
8. ^ a b c d e f g Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 1589
9. ^ a b c d e f Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
10. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier, p. 176
11. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
12. ^ a b c d e f g Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
13. ^ a b c d Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
14. ^ a b Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli