lanoso

Forms

lanoso (feminine lanosa, masculine plural lanosi, feminine plural lanose)^[1]

Etymology

It is learned: it is borrowed from Latin lānōsus (“woolly”), from lāna (“wool”) with the suffix -ōsus.^{[2][3][4][5][6]} Zingarelli calls the Latin word Late Latin, but Tommaseo notes it in Columella.^[3][7]

The Latin adjective also gave French laineux, Old Occitan lanos, Spanish lanoso and Romanian lânos.^[8][9]

The Latin noun goes back to Proto-Italic *wlānā and Proto-Indo-European *h₂ulh₁-neh₂- (“wool”), literally “plucked material”; whether it is related to vellus (“fleece”) and vellō (“to pluck”) is disputed.^[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in Dante's Inferno (1300–1313), in the sense “like wool”: “Quinci fuor quete le lanose gote / al nocchier de la livida palude” (then the woolly cheeks of the ferryman of the livid marsh were still).^[11][3][12]

Semantic evolution

The sense “covered with wool” appears in the 14th century in C. Ugurgieri's translation of the Aeneid, where King Latinus has sacrificed a hundred “lanose pecore” (woolly sheep); the TLIO's first record is the Italian Aeneid of Lancia of 1316.^[11][2][13] The word became a poetic epithet of flocks and rams: Poliziano writes of Neptune turning into “un lanoso montone” (a woolly ram), and Ariosto of “lanosi greggi”.^[2]

Tommaseo marked Dante's use for human hair as obsolete.^[7] Botany took up the word for leaves and other organs covered with long soft hairs, such as the bracts around the flower of the edelweiss;^[14] lanato is used in the same sense.^[14] GRADIT records names of animals such as opossum lanoso and ratto lanoso.^[5]

Timeline

• 1300–1313 – Dante uses lanose gote in the Inferno.^[11]
• 1316 – Lancia's Italian Aeneid uses the word.^[13]
• 14th century – C. Ugurgieri uses it for sheep covered with wool.^[11][2]

Meanings

Adjective

1. (literary) Covered with wool, rich in wool, especially of sheep: un gregge lanoso al pascolo.^{[5][15][3][14]}
2. By extension, covered with hair or a beard like wool.^[5][16][14]
3. woolly, like wool in look or feel: Ha una chioma lanosa e arruffata.^[5][15][1]
4. (botany) Of a plant organ, covered with long soft hairs; lanate.^{[5][15][14][1]}

Word family

• lanosità

Related words

• lana
• lanato
• lanuto
• Latin lāna

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d 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 Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
4. ^ Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
5. ^ a b c d e f De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
6. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
9. ^ Körting, Gustav (1907), Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch: etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Hauptsprachen, 3rd ed., Paderborn: Schöningh
10. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
11. ^ a b c d Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
12. ^ Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
13. ^ a b Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
14. ^ 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)
15. ^ a b c Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
16. ^ Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse