lottare

Forms

lottare (first-person singular present lòtto, first-person singular past historic lottài, past participle lottàto, auxiliary avére)^[1] Old Italian has luttare and loctare.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin luctor (“to wrestle, to struggle”), a verb first of athletics.^{[3][4][5][1][6]} The word is pan-Romance: French lutter, Occitan luchar, Catalan lluitar, Spanish luchar, Portuguese luitar and Romanian lupta.^[4][7] The noun lucta (“wrestling”) is a late derivative, of the 4th century, while luctātor (“wrestler”) is classical.^[3]

DELI calls the origin of the Latin verb unexplained, and DEI calls it uncertain.^[3][8] Nocentini, Devoto and de Vaan compare Ancient Greek λυγίζω (lugízō, “to bend, twist”) and a root Proto-Indo-European *lewg- (“to bend”), with reference to the bending of the limbs in wrestling.^[4][9][1] De Vaan takes it as a frequentative based on a past participle Proto-Italic *lukto- (“bent”), with cognates in Celtic and Gothic, but he finds the short vowel hard to explain.^[6][1] The older form Old Italian luttare precedes the modern one, which DELI first finds in Castiglione.^[3][2]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first record is the Aquilan poet Buccio di Ranallo, in his Leggenda di Santa Caterina of 1330, with the sense “to fight, to come into conflict”.^[2] DELI dates luttare to the 14th century, in anonymous Frottole, and the modern form lottare to Castiglione (before 1529), who held it useful for a courtier to know how to wrestle.^[3][10]

Semantic evolution

Old Italian already used the verb for striving hard towards a goal, and even of a flame that went on burning.^[2] The sporting sense lived on beside the figurative ones: Segneri wrote of the prizes won in ancient games by running, fighting and wrestling.^[10][11] Tommaseo noted lottare of winds and waves, and of a sailor facing the sea.^[11]

The noun lotta gave set phrases of the 19th century: lotta di classe (1883) translates Marx and Engels's German Klassenkampf, and lotta per l'esistenza (1864) translates Malthus's and Darwin's English struggle for existence.^[3] Today the verb is used of fighting for a cause, of struggling against hardship or illness, and in lottare con la morte, to be dying.^[12][13][14] GDLI records a second, rare lottare “to draw lots”, from lotto.^[15]

Timeline

• 1330 – Buccio di Ranallo uses lottare “to fight”.^[2]
• 14th century – Luttare is recorded in anonymous Frottole.^[3]
• Before 1375 – Boccaccio names the wrestling game lutta.^[3]
• Before 1529 – Castiglione uses the form lottare.^[3]
• 1864 – Lotta per l'esistenza appears in the Italian Darwin.^[3]
• 1883 – Lotta di classe is recorded.^[3]

Meanings

Verb

1. (sports) To wrestle, to practise wrestling as a sport.^[12][13][16]
2. To fight, to be engaged in a struggle, also in a battle or a war: I due lottavano a terra.^[12][13][5]
3. To struggle with every means for a goal (with per or contro): Hanno lottato per anni contro l'inquinamento del fiume.^[12][13][5]
4. (figurative) To try to resist something: lottare col sonno, lottare con sé stesso, to try to master one's impulses.^[12][13][14]
5. In lottare con la morte, to be gravely ill, to be dying.^[12][13][14]

Word family

• lotta
• lottatore
• colluttare
• colluttazione

Related words

• riluttare
• Latin luctor
• French lutter

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
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 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. ^ 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
7. ^ 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), p. 2273
9. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier
10. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 9, 229
11. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
12. ^ a b c d e f De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
13. ^ a b c d e f Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
14. ^ a b c Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
15. ^ Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
16. ^ Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana