fuggire

Forms

fuggire (first-person singular present fùggo, first-person singular past historic fuggìi, past participle fuggìto, auxiliary (intransitive) èssere or (transitive) avére)^[1] Old forms include Old Italian fugire, Old Italian fogire, Old Italian foire and the northern Old Italian foçir.^[2][3] The old present subjunctive was fuggia.^[4][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Late Latin fugīre (“to flee”), an infinitive which from the 4th century replaced classical ⟨fugere⟩.^[5][6][4][7] DEI says the change of conjugation was modelled on the perfect fūgī, and Körting held that the /u/ of the Romance forms calls for a form remade on the perfect, or else a semi-learned word.^[7][8] Devoto explains the double /dʒ/ as the normal lengthening of the consonant after the stress in a word stressed on the third syllable from the end, the classical verb crossed with the late one.^[9]

The verb is found across the Romance languages: French fuir, Occitan fugir, Catalan fugir, Spanish huir, Portuguese fugir, Sardinian fuire and Romanian fugi (“to run”).^[10][11] DÉRom reconstructs Proto-Romance */ˈɸuɡ-e-/ in two conjugations, the older one surviving beside the newer in northern and central Italy, in archaic Sardinian, in Francoprovençal, in Gascon and in some Catalan areas.^[12]

The Latin verb continues Proto-Italic *fugiō and an Indo-European present Proto-Indo-European *bʰug-i- (“to flee”) of the root *bʰewg-.^[13][1] It is related to Ancient Greek φεύγω (pheúgō, “I flee”) and Lithuanian bṹgti (“to fear”).^[10][13] The learned words fuga, fugace and fuggitivo come from its Latin derivatives.^[5][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first record is the Ritmo di sant'Alessio, a poem from the Marche of the second half of the 12th century.^[2] DELI dates the sense “to run away out of fear” to the poet Inghilfredi, of the 13th century, and the transitive “to avoid, shun” to Giacomo da Lentini, before 1250.^[5][6]

Semantic evolution

By the end of the 13th century the verb was used for an army in retreat (Bono Giamboni) and for taking refuge (Guittone d'Arezzo), and Guido Cavalcanti used it for failing or fading.^[5] Dante has time slipping away and, in the Inferno, the mother who “prende il figlio, e fugge, e non s’arresta” (“takes her child, and flees, and does not stop”).^[5][14] Old Italian also used it for steam or heat escaping and, as DEI notes, for hiding things or carrying them off in secret.^[2][7]

In sport fuggire is to break away from the pack in a cycle race, recorded from 1965.^[5] Its derivative fuga added the musical fugue (1581), the fuga di gas “gas leak” (1892) and the fuga dei cervelli “brain drain” (1966).^[5]

Timeline

• Second half of the 12th century – The Ritmo di sant'Alessio is the first record.^[2]
• Before 1250 – Giacomo da Lentini uses it in the sense “to avoid”.^[5]
• 13th century – Inghilfredi uses it for running away out of fear.^[5]
• Before 1292 – Bono Giamboni uses it for an army retreating.^[5]
• Before 1321 – Dante uses it for time passing quickly.^[5]
• 1794 – Fuggifuggi “stampede” is recorded.^[10]
• 1965 – The cycling sense “to break away” is recorded.^[5]

Meanings

Verb

1. (intransitive) To flee, to run away quickly from a place or a person, especially to escape danger: Tutti fuggirono dal palazzo in fiamme.^[6][4][15]
2. (intransitive) To take refuge somewhere safe: Molti fuggirono in Svizzera.^[6][4][16]
3. (intransitive) To escape from confinement, or leave a place to get away from constraint: Il prigioniero è fuggito di notte.^[6][4][17]
4. (intransitive, figurative) Of time, to pass quickly: Le vacanze sono fuggite in un attimo.^[6][16][15]
5. (intransitive, sport) In cycling, to break away from the other riders.^[4][16][15]
6. (transitive) To avoid, to shun: fuggire la compagnia dei curiosi.^[16][17][15]

Word family

• fuggiasco
• fuggifuggi
• fuggevole
• fuggente
• sfuggire
• sfuggente
• sfuggita

Related words

• fuga
• fuggitivo
• -fugo
• rifuggire
• fugace
• fugare
• Latin fugiō

Usage notes

In the intransitive senses the auxiliary is essere, in the transitive ones avere.^[1][15]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
3. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
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 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
6. ^ a b c d e f De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
7. ^ a b c Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 1730
8. ^ Körting, Gustav (1907), Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch: etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Hauptsprachen, 3rd ed., Paderborn: Schöningh
9. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier
10. ^ a b c d Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
11. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
12. ^ Buchi, Éva; Schweickard, Wolfgang, eds. (2008–), Dictionnaire Étymologique Roman (DÉRom), Nancy: ATILF, http://www.atilf.fr/DERom
13. ^ 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
14. ^ Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 6, 427
15. ^ a b c d e Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
16. ^ a b c d Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
17. ^ a b Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana