farnetico

Forms

farnetico (feminine farnetica, masculine plural farnetici, feminine plural farnetiche)^[1] An old form is Old Italian fernetico.^[2][3]

Etymology

The adjective is inherited from Latin phrenēticus (“delirious, mad”), the popular outcome of the word that was taken again in learned form as frenetico.^[4][5][6] The first syllable was changed by metathesis, ⟨fre-⟩ becoming ⟨far-⟩.^[7][3] The noun, “delirium, frenzy”, is a back-formation from Italian farneticare according to Nocentini, GRADIT and the GDLI, while DELI and Zingarelli treat noun and adjective as one word.^{[5][8][3][4][9]}

The Latin word, used by Cicero, is a form of Ancient Greek φρενιτικός (phrenitikós, “delirious”), from φρενῖτις (phrenîtis, “delirium”), from φρήν (phrḗn, “mind”).^[1][10][11] Other popular outcomes are Romanian firetic in Transylvania and Sardinian frenedigu “frenzy” in Logudorese, and Old French had the semi-learned Old French fernicle and fornicle.^[12][11]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first records are a Florentine translation of the Antidotarium Nicolai of the late 13th century, with the noun for a delirious patient, and Dante's Vita nuova (about 1292–1293).^[2] There Dante writes cominciai a travagliare sì come farnetica persona (“I began to toss about like a person in delirium”).^[3][8] DELI's first records are Giordano da Pisa's, for the adjective in 1302–1305 and for the noun “fit of frenzy” in 1305–1306.^[4]

Semantic evolution

In Old Italian farnetico was a medical word: the adjective for a person in a state of delirium, and the noun for that state, with avere il farnetico for “to rave”.^[2] In veterinary use it named a disease of the brain in domestic animals, and an animal suffering from it.^[2][13] The noun was extended to senseless talk and to a craze bound to fail: Boccaccio writes of people left nel farnetico d'andar cercando pietre nere giù per lo Mugnone (“in the frenzy of going to look for black stones down the Mugnone”).^[2][8]

Tommaseo noted that frenesia had become the usual word, though phrases such as gli è entrato il farnetico lived on.^[13] Today the adjective is uncommon or literary, and the noun means delirium, raving talk or a bizarre whim.^[14][6][9]

Timeline

• Late 13th century – a Florentine translation of the Antidotarium Nicolai uses the noun.^[2]
• About 1292–1293 – Dante uses farnetica persona in the Vita nuova.^[2][3]
• 1293–1294 – Dante uses the verb farneticare.^[4]
• 1302–1305 – Giordano da Pisa uses the adjective.^[4]
• 1305–1306 – Giordano da Pisa uses the noun “fit of frenzy”.^[4]
• Before 1342 – the noun's first date in Nocentini and GRADIT.^[5][8]
• 1612 – farneticamento is recorded in the first Crusca dictionary.^[4]

Meanings

Adjective

1. (literary or uncommon) Raving, delirious: Il vecchio, farnetico per la febbre, chiamava i figli.^[8][14][9]

Noun

1. (literary) delirium, raving; a fit of frenzy: dare in farnetichi, to fly into a rage.^[8][9][15]
2. Senseless talk, words without meaning.^[6][2]
3. (figurative) A craze, a bizarre or impossible whim.^[8][14][6]
4. (obsolete) A person who raves.^[9]

Word family

• farneticare
• farneticamento
• farneticamente

Related words

• frenetico
• frenesia
• Latin phrenēticus

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
3. ^ a b c d e Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 5, 692
4. ^ 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
5. ^ a b c Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b c d Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
7. ^ Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
8. ^ a b c d e f g De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
9. ^ a b c d e Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
10. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ a b Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 1600
12. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
13. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET, p. 2, 693
14. ^ 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
15. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli