lanciare

Forms

lanciare (first-person singular present làncio, first-person singular past historic lanciài, past participle lanciàto, auxiliary avére)^[1] Old Italian also had the form Old Italian lanzare.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Late Latin lanceō (“to wield or hurl a lance”), a Late Latin verb first found in Tertullian.^[3][4][5] The Latin verb was formed from lancea (“lance”), the source of Italian lancia.^[6][7][8][1] DEI places the Latin verb in the Italian area, Old Logudorese and western Romance.^[4]

The same verb is French lancer, Occitan lançar, Catalan llançar, Spanish lanzar and Portuguese lançar.^[6][1] The English word launch came from the Old North French form lancher, beside Old French lancier.^[9][1] Körting adds the Old Occitan compound eslansar and French élancer, with its noun élan.^[10]

The Latin noun was itself a loanword: the Oxford Latin Dictionary calls it apparently Celtic, and notes that Varro, as quoted by Gellius, held it to be Spanish.^[11] Wiktionary traces it to Celtic or Celtiberian, perhaps from Proto-Indo-European *pleh₂k- (“to hit”), and compares Ancient Greek λόγχη (lónkhē, “lance”).^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI dates the first use, “to hurl, throw with force”, also figuratively, to the 13th-century poem Il Fiore, and the reflexive “to throw oneself forward with impetus” to Giacomo da Lentini, in the Sicilian form si lanza.^[3] Prati gives the reflexive lanciarsi from Guido Cavalcanti.^[12]

Semantic evolution

The first sense was the literal one, to hurl a lance: Matteo Villani writes that “the king struck first with his lance” (Lo Re imprima lanciò), and the old sense “to wound with a lance” is recorded beside it.^[13][8] Dante's E quindi viene 'l duol che sì gli lancia (“and thence comes the grief that so pierces them”) was glossed by the commentator Buti as “torments them”; both senses are now obsolete.^[13][14] The general sense “to throw” spread to any object, weapon or sports implement.^[2][3]

From the 14th century the reflexive also meant to hurl oneself against someone or something (Cicerchia).^[3] The sense “to give something great speed”, of vehicles and the like, is dated by DELI to Marinetti in 1929.^[3] The figurative sense “to make known, bring before the public”, recorded in 1900, was treated by DEI as a separate word modelled on French lancer quelqu'un.^[3][15] Advertising and commerce took it up for new products, and computing for starting a program.^[7][14][16]

Compounds of the type lancia- + plural noun had existed in technical language (lanciasiluri, 1912), but became productive in the First World War, on the model of French lance-mines and lance-bombes: lanciabombe (1915), lanciafiamme (1918), later lanciarazzi and lanciamissili.^[3] DELI notes that the German compounds in -werfer (Minenwerfer) are older.^[3]

Timeline

• 13th century – Giacomo da Lentini uses the reflexive si lanza.^[3]
• 13th century – Il Fiore uses lanciare “to hurl”.^[3]
• Before 1292 – Lanciatore “thrower” appears in Giamboni.^[3]
• Before 1300 – Guido Cavalcanti writes si lancia.^[3]
• Before 1400 – Lancio “throw, leap” is recorded in Sacchetti.^[3]
• 1900 – The sense “to bring before the public” is recorded by Arlìa.^[3]
• 1912 – Lanciasiluri “torpedo tube” appears.^[3]
• 1915 – Lanciabombe appears in the newspapers.^[3]
• 1929 – Marinetti uses lanciare for giving something great speed.^[3]

Meanings

Verb

1. To throw or hurl something far and with force, by hand or with a device: Lanciò il bastone oltre la siepe.^[5][17][14]
2. To drop from above, especially from an aircraft: lanciare aiuti sui villaggi isolati.^[5][17]
3. To send an animal off at full speed; to give a vehicle strong acceleration so that it runs very fast.^[5][17][16]
4. (sport) In football, to pass the ball ahead to a teammate who is running forward; in cycling, lanciare la volata, to start the sprint.^[17][14][16]
5. (figurative) To utter forcefully (a cry, an insult); to direct (a look, a message) at someone.^[5][14]
6. (figurative) To put forward (an idea, a proposal); to launch or promote a product, a fashion or a performer through advertising.^[5][7][14]
7. (figurative) To introduce someone into a field or career and help them succeed.^[5][16]
8. (computing) To start or run a program.^[7][14][16]
9. (obsolete) To strike with a lance; to torment.^[14][16]
10. (reflexive, lanciarsi) To throw oneself forward with impetus, also from a height or with a parachute; figuratively, to throw oneself into an undertaking.^[14][16]

Word family

• lancio
• lanciatore
• lanciato
• lanciabile
• lanciabombe
• lanciafiamme
• lanciagranate
• lanciamissili
• lanciarazzi
• lanciasiluri
• rilanciare
• rilancio
• slanciare
• slanciato
• slancio

Related words

• lancia
• lanciamento
• lanciata
• lanciere
• Latin lancea
• French lancer

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
4. ^ a b Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975)
5. ^ a b c d e f g De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
6. ^ a b Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
7. ^ a b c d Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
8. ^ a b Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
9. ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
10. ^ Körting, Gustav (1907), Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch: etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Hauptsprachen, 3rd ed., Paderborn: Schöningh
11. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
12. ^ Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti
13. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
14. ^ a b c d e f g h i Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
15. ^ Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 2160
16. ^ a b c d e f g Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
17. ^ 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