gota

Forms

gota f (plural gote)^[1] The TLIO's Old Italian forms include ghota, golta and galta.^[2] The forms with ⟨l⟩ are frequent in the north.^[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *gauta (“cheek”), from Gaulish *gauta.^[4][5][6][7] The Gaulish origin, proposed by Jud and Dauzat and accepted by Meyer-Lübke, rests on the word's distribution: it is Gallo-Romance and radiates from Gaul into Lombardy, Romagna and western Tuscany.^[4][5][7] The same word is French joue, Occitan gauta and Catalan galta, and Romansh gaulta.^[7][5] Meyer-Lübke thought the Tuscan word came from Occitan.^[7] According to DELI it spread when Latin bucca, which had mainly meant “cheek”, narrowed to the sense “mouth”.^[4] Wartburg traces the Gaulish form to an earlier *gabŏta, from a base *gaba (“throat, crop”).^[5]

An older explanation derives it from Latin gabata (“bowl, dish”), used as a metaphor for the rounded cheek.^[8][4] Battisti and Alessio prefer this, comparing a northern Sardinian word for the cheek that comes from a Greek word for a bowl.^[3] DELI rejects it, though the plural in the sense “bowls” does occur in Castra's 13th-century poem.^[4][2]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first record is the Florentine Fiori di filosafi (1271–1275), with the sense “cheek”, the fleshy side of the face between the cheekbone and the chin.^[2] DELI's first record is Bono Giamboni, before 1292, whose Chi ti dà nell'una gota, para l'altra is the saying “whoever strikes you on one cheek, turn him the other”.^[4][9]

Semantic evolution

Old Italian had many phrases with the word: striking or being struck on the cheek, wetting one's cheeks with tears, beating or scratching one's cheeks in grief, swelling one's cheeks with pride.^[2] The phrase in gota or in gote meant “with a grave and solemn air”.^[2] It could also stand for the face, the mouth or a direction.^[2] Dante's lanose gote are Charon's bearded cheeks, and in the phrase in su la gota destra he uses it for “side”.^[9][6]

The cappuccio a gote, a man's hood worn from the 13th to the 15th century, came down over the cheeks.^[10] The swollen cheeks of mumps gave the name gotoni (northern galtoni), later reinterpreted as gattoni (before 1400, Franco Sacchetti) and as mal del montone (1640, Oudin).^[4][11] The augmentative gotone is recorded before 1712, in Magalotti.^[4] Today gota is a popular word in Tuscany and a literary one elsewhere; it also names the cheek cut of a butchered animal.^[12][10][6]

Timeline

• Before 1250 – Castra's poem from the Marche uses gote for “bowls”.^[4][2]
• 1271–1275 – gota “cheek” in the Florentine Fiori di filosafi.^[2]
• Before 1292 – Bono Giamboni: Chi ti dà nell'una gota, para l'altra.^[4][9]
• Before 1400 – Franco Sacchetti has gattoni for mumps.^[4]
• 1640 – Oudin records mal del montone.^[4]
• Before 1712 – Magalotti uses the augmentative gotone.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. cheek: each fleshy side of the face (popular in Tuscany, literary elsewhere): le gote arrossate dal freddo.^[6][12][10]
2. (butchery) The cheek of a slaughtered animal as a cut of meat: una gota di manzo.^[6][12][10]
3. (archaic, figurative) Side, part.^[6][12][13]

Word family

• gotata
• gotone

Related words

• French joue
• Catalan galta

Usage notes

Gota is also the feminine of the adjective and noun goto “Gothic, Goth”, a separate word from Late Latin Gothus.^[13] An obsolete botanical gota is a variant of cota, a kind of chamomile.^[3][14] Fixed phrases include cappuccio a gote and porgere l'altra gota “to turn the other cheek”.^[10][2]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
3. ^ a b c Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 1849
4. ^ 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
5. ^ a b c d Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
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 d Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
8. ^ Körting, Gustav (1907), Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch: etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Hauptsprachen, 3rd ed., Paderborn: Schöningh
9. ^ a b c Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 6, 989
10. ^ a b c d e Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
11. ^ Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti
12. ^ a b c d Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
13. ^ a b Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
14. ^ Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 6, 990