Etymologically
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io

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Pronunciation

Forms

io (object forms me, mi; plural noi)[2][1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *eo, a spoken form of Latin ĕgō (“I”).[3][4][2][5][1] The shortened form is what all the Romance languages continue: Old French jou (modern French je), Occitan jo, Catalan jo, Spanish yo, Portuguese eu, Sardinian eo and Romanian eu.[4][6] Old Italian also had eo, and verse and popular Tuscan use the shortened ⟨i'⟩ and ⟨e'⟩ before a verb.[7][5][8]

Latin ego is the nominative of the inherited first-person pronoun, whose other cases were built on a different stem, that of mē (“me”).[4] The pronoun is continued across the family: Ancient Greek ἐγώ (egṓ), Sanskrit अहम् (ahám), Hittite ūk, Lithuanian aš, Old Church Slavonic азъ (azŭ), Gothic 𐌹𐌺 (ik) and Old English ic.[4][9] De Vaan reconstructs Proto-Indo-European *h₁eǵ with the extended forms ⟨*h₁eǵ-(o)H⟩ and ⟨*h₁eǵ-H-om⟩: Latin and Greek added an element that gave a long final ⟨-ō⟩, while Indo-Iranian, Slavic and Germanic show an ending ⟨*-om⟩, so that several variants of the pronoun probably existed side by side in Proto-Indo-European.[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in the Testimonianze di Travale of 1158, a Tuscan record of witnesses' statements.[3][4] GRADIT gives a date before 1249.[2] The noun “the self” is recorded before 1347 in Bartolomeo da San Concordio, who wrote L'amico è un altro io (“The friend is another self”).[3]

Semantic evolution

Pietro Bembo observed in the 16th century that verse used i’ for io whenever it stood immediately before the verb.[3] As a pronoun io is a subject only; the object and the cases with prepositions use me and mi, and since the verb ending shows the person, io is normally left out except for emphasis or contrast.[2][7][8]

The noun developed with philosophy and psychology: the Io of idealist philosophy (Io trascendentale, Io assoluto), the io narrante (narrating “I”) of literary criticism, and in psychoanalysis the ego, which in Freud's division stands between the Es and the Super-Io.[2][8] Super-io is a calque, recorded in 1926, of German Über-Ich.[4] The plural of the noun is normally the same, but Migliorini recorded ii in 1950, quoting Devoto's dei due Ii proustiani (“of the two Proustian selves”).[3][8]

Timeline

  • 1158 – The Testimonianze di Travale have io.[3][4]
  • Before 1249 – GRADIT's date for the pronoun.[2]
  • Before 1347 – Bartolomeo da San Concordio uses the noun “the self”.[3]
  • 1926 – Super-io appears, a calque of German Über-Ich.[4]
  • 1950 – Migliorini records the plural ii.[3]
  • 1957 – Io is recorded as the name of a genus of molluscs.[2]

Meanings

Pronoun

  1. I, the speaker referring to themselves, used only as a subject and usually left out: Io resto qui, voi andate pure.[2][7][10]
  2. Placed after the verb for emphasis: Stasera pago io.[2][7]
  3. Strengthened by stesso, anche, nemmeno or proprio: l'ho controllato io stesso.[2][5]
  4. As a predicate: Chi ha chiamato? Ero io.[2][7]

Noun

  1. The self, a person's own being as they are conscious of it.[2][8][3]
  2. (philosophy) The thinking subject: Io trascendentale.[2][8]
  3. (psychoanalysis) The ego, mediating between the Es, the Super-Io and reality; usually capitalised.[8][2]
  4. (literary criticism) Io narrante, the narrator of a story told in the first person.[8][2]

Word family

  • super-io

Usage notes

After come and quanto in comparisons, Italian uses me rather than io unless the verb is repeated.[8] The phrase io sono io e tu sei tu marks a difference of rank or situation between the speaker and another.[8][10] In bureaucratic forms io sottoscritto (“I, the undersigned”) opens a declaration.[2][10]

GRADIT also lists io as the name of a genus of freshwater molluscs of the Americas (1957) and, in vanessa io, of the peacock butterfly, both from the name of Io, the nymph loved by Jupiter.[2][11]

References

  1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
  5. ^ a b c Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
  6. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
  7. ^ 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
  8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
  9. ^ 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
  10. ^ a b c Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
  11. ^ Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 8, 482