gomito

Forms

gomito m (plural gomiti)^[1] Old Italian forms include gombito, conbito, gubito, goveto and gomedhe.^[2] The older Tuscan gombito is in Cavalca and Boccaccio, and Buti has govito.^[3] A popular Tuscan plural is le gomita.^[4][5]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin cubitum (“elbow”), also cubitus, through the older form Old Italian gombito.^{[6][7][8][1][9]} The ⟨mb⟩ of the older form points to Vulgar Latin *cumbitus (Sabatini–Coletti, GDLI), which GDLI and Devoto explain as a crossing with *gumbus (“hunched, bent”).^[10][11][12] The voiced initial /g/ for Latin /k/ is not unusual in Tuscan before /o/.^[10] The learned borrowing of the same word is cubito.^[7][1]

The word is pan-Romance: French coude, Occitan coide, Catalan colde, Spanish codo, Portuguese cóvado, Sardinian cùidu and Romanian cot.^[7][9]

The origin of the Latin word is disputed.^[6][13] The ancients connected it with cubō (“to lie down”), since Romans reclined on the elbow to eat.^[13][11] DELI rejects that link and calls the word of uncertain origin, while Nocentini accepts it for want of a better one.^[6][7] De Vaan also finds it the safest explanation, as a use of the past participle of the verb, having rejected a PIE root shared with the verb and the comparison with Ancient Greek κύβος (kúbos).^[13][1] GRADIT and GDLI point to Ancient Greek κύβιτον (kúbiton), used especially in the Greek of Sicily.^[8][11]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first record is in the Milanese poems of Bonvesin, at the end of the 13th century, in the anatomical sense, the joint between the upper arm and the forearm.^[2] DELI dates it to 1310 in Bencivenni and before 1342 in Cavalca, who writes of calluses on a saint's knees and elbows per lo molto orare (“from much praying”).^[6][11]

Semantic evolution

Old Italian also used the word for the part of a sleeve over the elbow, recorded before 1400 in Sacchetti, for the corner of a wall or street, and, as in Latin, for a measure of length from the elbow to the tip of the middle finger.^[6][2][3] DEI records the figurative gomito di mare, an inlet.^[9]

Idioms grew around the joint: alzare il gomito “to drink too much”, recorded by Tommaseo, gomito a gomito “side by side”, farsi largo a forza di gomiti “to elbow one's way”, and olio di gomito “elbow grease”.^[14][4][15] Gomitata “a blow with the elbow” is in Firenzuola (1518–1525).^[6] The technical sense of a bent joint or pipe fitting is dated 1952, and medicine knows the gomito del tennista, tennis elbow.^[6][4]

Timeline

• Late 13th century – Bonvesin uses the word for the elbow.^[2]
• 1310 – Bencivenni uses gomito.^[6]
• Before 1342 – Cavalca uses gomito.^[6]
• Before 1400 – Sacchetti uses it for the elbow of a sleeve.^[6]
• 1518–1525 – Firenzuola uses gomitata.^[6]
• 1948 – Sgomitare “to elbow one's way” is recorded.^[7]
• 1952 – Bernari uses it for an angled joint or fitting.^[6]

Meanings

Noun

1. (anatomy) The elbow, the joint between the upper arm and the forearm; in common use its outer point: Si è sbucciato il gomito cadendo dalla bici.^[8][4][10]
2. The elbow of a sleeve: Il maglione è consumato ai gomiti.^[8][4][10]
3. (figurative) A sharp bend in a road, river or path: Dopo il ponte il torrente fa un gomito.^[8][4][16]
4. (technical) A curved elbow fitting joining two pipes;^[8][10][16] albero a gomiti, a crankshaft.^[8][10][16]
5. (historical) An old measure of length, about from the elbow to the tip of the middle finger; a cubito.^[8][4]

Word family

• gomitata
• sgomitare
• gomitiera
• gomitello

Related words

• cubito
• Latin cubitum
• French coude

Usage notes

Alzare il gomito means to drink too much, and olio di gomito is hard manual effort.^[4][16] A Pisan gomito of the 14th century, a form of comito (the overseer of galley rowers), and an obsolete gomito “ball of thread”, from gomitolo, are separate words.^[9][11]

References

1. ^ a b c d e 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 Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 516
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
5. ^ Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
6. ^ 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
7. ^ a b c d e Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
8. ^ a b c d e f g h De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
9. ^ a b c d Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 1842
10. ^ a b c d e f Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
11. ^ 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
12. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier, p. 206
13. ^ a b c de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
14. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
15. ^ Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
16. ^ a b c d Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana