infinito

Forms

infinito (feminine infinita, masculine plural infiniti, feminine plural infinite)^[1] As a noun it is masculine, plural infiniti.^[1] Old forms include enfenito, enfinito, infenito and enfenuto.^[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is a learned word: it is borrowed from Latin infīnītus (“boundless, endless”).^[4][5][3][1] The Latin adjective is formed from the negative prefix in- and fīnītus (“limited”), the past participle of fīniō (“to limit, bound”).^[5][6][7][8] It corresponds to Ancient Greek ἄπειρον (ápeiron), the boundless of Anaximander, and the philosophical concept spread through medieval philosophy into all the western Romance languages, as in French infini (13th century).^[4][9]

The grammatical sense goes back to the Latin grammarians, who used the adjective and īnfīnītīvus as nouns, with modus (“mood”) understood.^[4] This was an inexact rendering of Ancient Greek ἀπαρέμφατος (aparémphatos, “undefined”).^[9][10] In 1550 Corso explained that the mood is so called because it alone is “without end”.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in the Venetian translation of the Pamphilus, about 1250.^[2] The early sense is “without limits in space or time”, and as a noun “that which has no limits”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

In the early 14th century Giordano da Pisa and Dante use infinito for what seems boundless, and Dante for God, who has neither beginning nor end.^[4] Iacopone's La Bontade enfinita vole enfinito amore (“infinite Goodness wants infinite love”) is from before 1306.^[4] Cecco d'Ascoli, before 1327, uses it in the strict sense of something wholly without spatial or temporal bounds.^[4] The sense “countless” is in Iacopone as enfenuto and in Francesco da Barberino before 1348.^[4]

The hyperbolic use for anything very great or long is recorded from Palmieri, before 1475, and Galileo remarked in 1623 that infinito was used every day in place of “very great”.^[4] In mathematics the word gave infinitesimo, with the ordinal suffix -esimo, which in turn gave infinitesimale.^[4] It was borrowed as Maltese infinit.^[1]

Timeline

• c. 1250 – the Venetian Pamphilus has the first record.^[2]
• 1304 – Giordano da Pisa and Dante use infinito.^[4][11]
• 1304–1308 – Dante uses it of God and as a noun.^[4]
• Before 1306 – Iacopone writes enfinito.^[4]
• Before 1327 – Cecco d'Ascoli uses the strict sense “without any bounds”.^[4]
• 1550 – Corso explains the grammatical term modo infinito.^[4]
• 1623 – Galileo comments on the hyperbolic use of the word.^[4]
• 1763 – infinitesimale is first recorded, in Baretti.^[4]

Meanings

Adjective

1. infinite: having no beginning, end or limit in space, time or quantity: la serie infinita dei numeri primi.^[11][7][12]
2. (hyperbolic) Immensely great, deep or intense; endless: una calma infinita.^[11][7][13]
3. (hyperbolic, in the plural) Countless, very many.^[11][7][10]
4. (grammar) Of the infinitive mood.^[10][1]

Noun

1. infinity: space or time without limits; the boundless.^[11][12][10]
2. (mathematics) The infinite, the concept opposed to finiteness.^[10][3]
3. (grammar) The infinitive, the verb mood without person or number.^[10][8][1]

Word family

• infinità
• infinitamente
• infinitesimo
• infinitesimale
• infinitivo
• infinitezza
• infinitudine

Related words

• finito
• finire
• fine
• Latin infinitus
• French infini

Usage notes

All'infinito means “endlessly, over and over”.^[12][8] Grazie infinite is a common formula of thanks.^[11][12] DEI treats the grammatical noun as a separate head, while the other dictionaries keep one entry.^[9][11][10]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g 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 c 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 g h i j k l m n o p q r Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
5. ^ a b Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
6. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ 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
8. ^ a b c Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
9. ^ a b c Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 2018
10. ^ a b c d e f g Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
11. ^ a b c d e f g De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
12. ^ a b c d Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
13. ^ Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli