fetere

Forms

fetere (first-person singular present fèto, first-person singular past historic fetéi, past participle fetùto, auxiliary avére)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin foeteō (“to stink”).^[2][3][1][4] Wiktionary sets up a Vulgar Latin *fĕtĕre with short vowels between them.^[1] The Latin verb also has the spellings faetēre and fetēre.^[2][5][6] The GDLI calls the Italian verb learned, and Tommaseo a Latinism to be used only in some tenses and moods.^[7][8]

DEI places the word in the south of Italy and in Iberia: popular outcomes are Spanish heder and Portuguese feder.^[4][2] Meyer-Lübke lists Dalmatian fit, Sicilian fetiri and Tarantino fetere as well.^[9]

Treccani gives the Latin verb as of unknown origin.^[5] Nocentini compares fimus (“dung”) and foedus (“repulsive”).^[2] De Vaan proposes Proto-Italic *fwoit- (“smoking, smelly”), from a PIE root meaning “smoke”, Proto-Indo-European *dʰuoh₂-i-, which would make it a relative of Old Irish dé (“smoke”) and Hittite tuḫḫuwai- (“smoke”).^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first record is in the Sicilian of Giovanni Campulu of Messina (1302–1337), with the sense “to give off a repulsive smell”.^[10] In Old Italian it could also mean “to bear the traces of contemptible things”.^[10]

Semantic evolution

The Tuscan texts use it of Lazarus, dead four days, who fetea, “stank”.^[7][8] Ariosto has his speakers kill the goats che più fetean, “that stank most”, and D'Annunzio writes of leaving la città che sanguina e che fete, “the city that bleeds and stinks”.^[7]

The verb is defective: it is used mostly in the third person of the simple tenses and in the present participle, and lacks the past participle and compound tenses.^{[11][12][13][14]} The participle fetente lives on as a common adjective, and its use as an insult comes from Naples.^[5][4] Today the verb is literary or southern.^[14][1]

Timeline

• 1302–1337 – Giovanni Campulu uses fetere in Messina.^[10]
• Before 1342 – The verb is recorded in Tuscan.^[3][2]
• 1991 – The Neapolitan derivative fetecchia is recorded.^[2]

Meanings

Verb

1. (intransitive, literary or southern) To stink, give off a foul smell: Il pesce rimasto al sole fete.^{[3][11][14][13][1]}

Word family

• fetente
• fetenzia
• fetecchia

Related words

• fetido
• fetore
• Latin foeteō

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
3. ^ a b c De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
4. ^ a b c Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 1627
5. ^ a b c Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
6. ^ 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
7. ^ a b c Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
8. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
9. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
10. ^ a b c Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
11. ^ a b Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
12. ^ Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
13. ^ a b Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
14. ^ a b c Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana