getto

Forms

getto m (plural getti)^[1] The older and literary form is gitto.^[2][3] Old Italian texts also have gietto, Old Italian gipto and Old Italian çeto.^[4]

Etymology

It is a deverbal noun from Italian gettare (“to throw”).^[5][6][7][8] Wiktionary instead takes it straight from Vulgar Latin *iectus, an altered form of iactus (“a throw”).^[1]

The verb continues Vulgar Latin *iectāre, which took the place of classical Latin iactāre, the frequentative of iaciō (“to throw”).^[5][6] Its vowel is the one the compounds of the Latin verb had, such as coniectāre, disiectāre and iniectāre.^[5] The older variant of the verb, gittare, was long well established beside it, and the noun gitto goes with it.^[5]

The noun has parallels in French jet, Old Occitan get and Portuguese geito, all from the same Latin type.^[9] REW adds that the French and Occitan word also reached Old Italian as geto.^[9] De Vaan traces the Latin verb to the root Proto-Indo-European *(H)ieh₁- (“to throw, let go”), also behind Ancient Greek ἵημι (híēmi, “to send, throw”).^[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first record is in a poem of Giacomo da Lentini of 1230–1250, in a Tuscan copy.^[4] There the word is the throwing of cargo overboard to lighten a ship in a storm: a ship that throws all its heavy goods to the storm e scampane per getto periglioso, “and escapes by a dangerous jettison”.^[11][4] DELI's first date for this nautical sense is 1313, in Francesco da Barberino.^[5]

Semantic evolution

Old Italian already used the word widely: a throw in general, getto di pietra for the distance a stone can be thrown, a throw of the dice, the casting of a fishing or bird net and the catch it brought in, a falling drop, a flash of lightning, a shoot of a plant and a projecting part of a building.^[4] Casting gave the craft senses: the pouring of molten metal into a mould is recorded in the 14th century, the piece obtained by it about 1465, in Filarete, and a poured mass of concrete or mortar in 1550, in Cosimo Bartoli.^[5]

The sense “shoot, sprout” appears in northern forms such as zeto and gieto before 1380, and as getto before 1685, in Daniello Bartoli.^[5] The general sense “act of throwing” is dated from Galileo, who died in 1642.^[5] The jet of a liquid or gas is first dated 1910, in D'Annunzio.^[5] This sense gave the set phrases a getto continuo, without a break, and di getto, at one go and without second thoughts, said of writing or painting.^[5][12][3]

In the 20th century, under the influence of English jet, getto also became a word for jet propulsion and for the jet aircraft itself.^[3][5] English took the Italian word in the 17th century as jetto, a jet of water, first recorded in 1644.^[13]

Timeline

• 1230–1250 – Giacomo da Lentini uses getto for the jettisoning of cargo.^[4][11]
• 1313 – Francesco da Barberino has the nautical sense.^[5]
• 14th century – The Ottimo commento uses the word for casting metal in a mould.^[5]
• Before 1380 – Paganino Bonafè has zeto and gieto for a plant shoot.^[5]
• c. 1465 – Filarete uses getto for a cast piece.^[5]
• 1550 – Cosimo Bartoli uses it for a poured mass of concrete.^[5]
• Before 1642 – Galileo uses it for the act of throwing.^[5]
• 1644 – English jetto “jet of water” is recorded.^[13]
• 1910 – D'Annunzio uses it for a jet of liquid or gas.^[5]
• 1956 – Getto is recorded for a jet stream and as a clipping of aviogetto.^[5][7]

Meanings

Noun

1. The act of throwing and its result; in athletics, getto del peso is the shot put.^[7][12][2]
2. A jet: a forceful outflow of a liquid or a gas, such as the spout of a fontana: Dalla tubatura rotta usciva un getto d'acqua gelata.^[7][2][12]
3. (botany) A shoot or young branch of a plant.^[7][2][3]
4. (metallurgy) casting: the pouring of molten metal into a mould; also the piece made in this way.^[7][12][3]
5. (building) A pour of concrete or cement that forms a continuous visible part of a structure.^[7][12]
6. (hunting) A way of hunting larks with an owl as a decoy.^[7][3]
7. (mechanics) A jet of a carburettor: a screw with a small calibrated hole that lets a measured amount of fuel into the air.^[7][12]
8. (figurative, uncommon) Throwing away, waste: fare getto di is to squander something: Ha fatto getto di tutti i risparmi in un mese.^[2][3][14]

Word family

• sopraggitto
• aviogetto

Related words

• gettare
• gettata
• gettito
• gettone
• Latin iactus
• French jet

Usage notes

GRADIT and Zingarelli list a second getto, “jet aircraft” or “jet stream”, recorded from 1956: Zingarelli calls it an adaptation of English jet, GRADIT a clipping of aviogetto.^[7][12][5] The older form gitto survives only in poetry.^[12][3]

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
3. ^ 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)
4. ^ a b c d e Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
6. ^ a b Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
8. ^ Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 1795
9. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
10. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
11. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
12. ^ a b c d e f g h Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
13. ^ a b Stammerjohann, Harro, et al. (2008), Dizionario di italianismi in francese, inglese, tedesco, Firenze: Accademia della Crusca; online at difit.italianisticaonline.it
14. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli