fossa

Forms

fossa f (plural fosse)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin fossa (“ditch, trench”), from the feminine of fossus, the past participle of fodiō (“to dig”).^[2][3][4][1] The Latin noun is an ellipsis of fossa terra (“dug-up earth”).^[1]

The word is found all over the Romance languages: French fosse, Occitan fossa, Catalan fossa, Spanish huesa, Portuguese fossa, Sardinian fossa and dialectal Romanian foasă.^[3][5] In Old Spanish fuesa meant “grave”.^[5] Celtic borrowed it as well: Welsh has ffoss.^[5][6] In the Italian dialects it competes with outcomes of Latin fovea and of fossātum.^[6]

fodiō goes back to the root Proto-Indo-European *bʰedʰ- “to dig”, with an o-grade present, and is related to Lithuanian bèsti (“to pierce, dig”) and Welsh bedd (“grave”).^[3][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI's earliest date is for a defensive ditch around a town or camp, in Bono Giamboni, who died in 1292; a pit dug in the ground in general is first dated to Iacopone da Todi (before 1306).^[2]

Semantic evolution

The sense “grave”, the pit into which a coffin is lowered, appears in Giordano da Pisa about 1304;^[2][6] DEI traces it to the Vulgate, spread by the Church.^[2][6] Dante (before 1321) uses it of a hollow of the body, the start of the anatomical sense, and of the moats around a city: dentro a l'alte fosse / che vallan quella terra sconsolata (“inside the deep moats that fence that desolate city”).^[2][8] The geological sense, a sunken part of the earth's crust, is dated 1892.^[2][9]

Older Italian had a plural fossora beside fosse.^[10][11] Expressions include avere un piede nella fossa, to be near death, and la fossa dei leoni, from the story of Daniel.^[4][11] La fossa dei serpenti became a name for the horrors of the asylum through the Italian title of Mary Jane Ward's novel The Snake Pit (1947) and its film.^[8]

Timeline

• 1281 – the derivative fossato is recorded.^[2]
• Before 1292 – Bono Giamboni uses fossa for a defensive ditch, and fosso in the same sense.^[2]
• c. 1304 – Giordano da Pisa uses it for a grave.^[2]
• Before 1306 – Iacopone da Todi uses it for a pit dug in the ground.^[2]
• Before 1321 – Dante uses it for an anatomical hollow.^[2]
• 1726 – Fossetta is recorded for a dimple in the cheek.^[2]
• 1892 – it is first recorded for a sunken area of the earth's crust.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A natural hollow in the ground, usually broad and deep.^[12]
2. A pit dug in the ground, of a size and shape that depend on its use: hanno scavato una fossa per piantare il ciliegio.^[12][4][9]
3. A grave, the pit in which the dead are buried; by extension the tomb, and death itself: fossa comune, a mass grave.^[12][4][9]
4. (historical) A moat or ditch around the walls of a castle or town; a ditch, a channel.^[9][8][12]
5. (anatomy) A fossa, a hollow or depression in a bone or other structure: fosse nasali.^[12][9][1]
6. (geology) A trench or rift, a sunken area of the earth's crust: fossa oceanica, fossa tettonica.^[9][11][13]
7. (technology) A pit built for a technical purpose: fossa biologica or settica, a septic tank;^[4][11][8] fossa di riparazione, the pit from which mechanics work under a vehicle.^[4][11][8]

Word family

• fosso
• fossato
• fossetta
• affossare
• infossare
• avanfossa
• fossaiolo

Related words

• fogna
• fossore
• Latin fodiō
• French fosse

Usage notes

Fossa is also the name of a carnivorous mammal of Madagascar (Cryptoprocta ferox), dated to 1917 by GRADIT and to the 19th century by DEI;^[12][6][8] GRADIT treats it as a separate masculine invariable noun, taken from French and probably of Malagasy origin.^[12][6][8] Fosso is the more common word for a drainage ditch, and formaggio di fossa is a cheese matured in pits.^[8]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m 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 Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
4. ^ a b c d e f Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
5. ^ a b c Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
6. ^ a b c d e f Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 1698
7. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
8. ^ a b c d e f g h Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
9. ^ a b c d e f Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
10. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
11. ^ a b c d e Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
12. ^ a b c d e f g De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
13. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli