lavorare

Forms

lavorare (first-person singular present lavóro, first-person singular past historic lavorài, past participle lavoràto, auxiliary avére)^[1] Old forms include laborare and lagorare.^[2] Many northern dialects have forms without /v/: Venetian laorar, Lombard laurà, Emilian laurar and Piedmontese lauré.^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin labōrō (“to toil, labour; to till”).^[3][4][5][1] The Latin verb is formed on labor (“toil, work”).^[4][6][1] In the western Romance languages the inherited verb mostly means “to plough”: Occitan labrar, Catalan llaurar, Spanish labrar, Portuguese lavrar and Sardinian laorare.^[4][7] French labourer is a learned form according to Nocentini and was taken from Occitan according to Meyer-Lübke.^[4][7] The DEI describes the verb as a word of the western Romance area that competed with the continuations of operor (“to work”).^[8]

The origin of the Latin noun is uncertain.^[6][1] It is often linked with labō (“to totter”), through a shift from “sinking under a load” to “burden” and “work”, a connection de Vaan finds unconvincing;^[6][1][9] Devoto relates it to lābor (“to slip, fall”).^[6][1][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first records are in the 13th century: in a Venetian contract of 1288, and in the Veronese poem Della caducità della vita umana, where the gravedigger says Deo... que fa sta zento? while he a la fossa lavora (“works at the grave”).^[3][2] The sense is to spend one's strength in a trade or task.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The intransitive verb took on further senses: of animals that toil (before 1519, Leonardo), of machines and bodily organs that function (before 1537, Biringuccio), and of shops and offices that do business (1869, Tommaseo); Tommaseo also records “to act behind the scenes”.^[3] As a transitive verb it meant “to work a material into shape” in Domenico Cavalca (before 1342) and “to make, execute” in Boccaccio.^[3] Working the land, lavorare la terra, is close to the sense of the western Romance words for ploughing.^[5][4]

Many figurative phrases are built on it: lavorare di gomiti (to elbow one's way), lavorare di fantasia (to daydream) and lavorare per la gloria (to work for nothing).^[5][10][11] Derivatives include lavoratore “worker”, from Late Latin laborator, and lavorazione, both of the 13th century, and lavorante of the 14th.^[4]

Timeline

• 13th century – Lavorare is in Della caducità della vita umana.^[3]
• 1288 – It appears in a Venetian contract.^[3]
• Before 1342 – Domenico Cavalca uses it transitively, “to work a material”.^[3]
• Before 1519 – Leonardo uses it of animals at work.^[3]
• Before 1537 – Biringuccio uses it of machines that function.^[3]
• 1869 – Tommaseo records “to do business” of shops and offices.^[3]

Meanings

Verb

1. (intransitive) To work, spend one's energies on an activity: ha lavorato tutta la notte alla tesi.^[5][11][12]
2. (intransitive) To have a job, practise a trade: lavora in un ospedale, lavorare come cuoco.^[5][12][13]
3. (intransitive) Of animals, to toil for people.^[5][12]
4. (intransitive) Of machines, plants or organs, to function, run.^[5][12][1]
5. (intransitive) Of a shop or office, to do business, have customers.^[5][12]
6. (transitive) To work, shape or process a material: lavorare il marmo.^[3][1][10]
7. (transitive) To knead dough.^[1]
8. (transitive) To cultivate, till: lavorare la terra.^[1][5]
9. (transitive, rare) To work on someone, win them over.^[1]

Word family

• lavorante
• lavorativo
• lavorato
• lavoratore
• lavorazione
• lavorio
• lavoricchiare
• lavorabile
• rilavorare

Related words

• lavoro
• laborioso
• Latin labor
• English labour

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m 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, p. 8, 853
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l 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 Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
6. ^ a b c d de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
7. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
8. ^ Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975)
9. ^ a b Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier, p. 255
10. ^ a b Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
11. ^ a b Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
12. ^ a b c d e Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
13. ^ Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana