madre

Forms

madre f (plural madri)^[1] The old form is matre.^[2][3][1] Old and dialect forms also include mader, mare and mate.^[4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin māter (“mother”) (accusative ⟨mātrem⟩).^[5][6][7][1] The ⟨d⟩ is unexpected, since Tuscan normally keeps Latin ⟨t⟩ between vowels and before ⟨r⟩, and is usually explained by northern Italian influence.^[6][3][8] DELI finds this hard to accept for a word of the basic family vocabulary,^[5] while DEI calls the word northern in origin, replaced in Tuscany by mamma.^[9] The older form matre shows the Tuscan sound.^[1][2]

The same word is French mère, Occitan maire, Catalan mare and Spanish madre.^[6][10] Only the familiar word survives in Sardinian mama and Romanian mamă.^[6]

Latin ⟨māter⟩ continues Proto-Italic *mātēr and Proto-Indo-European *méh₂tēr.^[11][1] The same word is Ancient Greek μήτηρ (mḗtēr), Old Church Slavonic мати (mati), Old High German muoter and Irish máthair.^[6][11] De Vaan and Nocentini think it may be a formation with the kinship suffix ⟨*-ter-⟩ from the nursery word ⟨*mā-⟩ “mum”.^[11][6]

Earliest recorded meaning

Nocentini and GRADIT date the word to about 1224.^[6][7] DELI's first records are before 1250: mare in Cielo d'Alcamo, who has a girl send her suitor a mia mare e a mon peri “to my mother and my father”, and madre in an anonymous poem.^[5][4]

Semantic evolution

The figurative sense “origin, cause” appears about 1243 in Guido Faba (as matre), and Dante uses the word for the female of animals.^[5] It became a title for professed nuns before 1342, and in the 16th century a name for the dregs of wine and for tools that receive another part.^[5][9] A madre was also the counterfoil of a receipt book, kept as proof of the part torn off (1773, Cesare Beccaria).^[5]

The anatomical dura madre and pia madre, the outer and inner meninges, are calques through Medieval Latin of an Arabic term “mother of the brain”, which Stephen of Antioch translated as mater cerebri in 1127.^[5][6] Madreperla was popularly taken as the “mother of pearls”, and Ferrante Imperato coined madrepora on its model in 1599.^[5] Since the Gulf War of 1991 journalists have imitated la madre di tutte le battaglie “the mother of all battles”.^[5]

In the sense of a woman who bore a child, madre carries respect and distance, while mamma is the affectionate word.^[4][2]

Timeline

• c. 1224 – Madre is first recorded.^[6][7]
• c. 1243 – Guido Faba uses matre for an origin or cause.^[5]
• Before 1250 – Cielo d'Alcamo writes mare.^[5]
• Before 1342 – Domenico Cavalca uses it as a title of nuns.^[5]
• 1599 – Ferrante Imperato names the madrepora.^[5]
• 1773 – Cesare Beccaria uses it for the counterfoil of a receipt book.^[5]
• Before 1810 – Madrelingua “mother tongue” is first recorded.^[5][6]
• 1991 – Madre di tutte le battaglie spreads from the Gulf War.^[5]

Meanings

Noun

1. mother, a woman who has given birth to a child, in relation to the child: Sua madre fa la maestra.^[7][2][3]
2. The female parent of an animal.^[7][3][12]
3. A woman who cares for someone like a mother: essere una seconda madre per qualcuno.^[7][12]
4. (often capitalized) The Virgin Mary, as in Madre di Dio.^[7][13]
5. A title of professed nuns: madre superiora.^[7][3][12]
6. (figurative) The origin or cause of something: L'ignoranza è madre di molti mali.^[3][14][5]
7. (bureaucracy) The counterfoil of a receipt book.^[3][5]
8. Madre dell'aceto, the mother of vinegar.^[3][6]

Adjective

1. That is a mother: ragazza madre “unmarried mother”, regina madre “queen mother”.^[3][13]
2. Being the origin or principal one: casa madre “headquarters”, lingua madre.^[3][7][1]

Word family

• madrina
• madrelingua
• madrepatria
• madreperla
• madrepora
• madreselva
• madrevite
• madreggiare

Related words

• matre
• matrigna
• genitore
• mamma
• padre
• materno
• Latin mater

Usage notes

Madre mia! is an exclamation of surprise or dismay.^[3] Dura madre and pia madre are also written as one word.^[6][7]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
4. ^ a b c Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
8. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier, p. 266
9. ^ a b Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 2307
10. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
11. ^ a b c de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
12. ^ a b c Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
13. ^ a b Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
14. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli