materiale

Forms

materiale m or f by sense (plural materiali)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Late Latin māteriālis (“of matter, material”), a learned word recorded in Latin in Macrobius.^{[2][3][4][5][6][1]} The Latin adjective is formed from māteria (“matter; timber”) with the suffix -ālis.^[3][1] DEI and the GDLI compare French matériel, recorded from the 14th century, and English material;^[4][7][5] GRADIT compares Ancient Greek ὑλικός (hulikós).^[4][7][5]

māteria is traditionally derived from māter (“mother”) in the sense “source”; its philosophical sense “matter” is a loan from Ancient Greek ὕλη (húlē, “wood; matter”), introduced by Cicero.^[1] The inherited outcomes of the Latin noun mean “wood”: Spanish madera and Portuguese madeira.^[1] Zingarelli dates the Italian adjective from 1268, DELI from Dante (1304–1308).^[8][2]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI's first records are in Dante's Convivio (1304–1308), for what belongs to or concerns matter, and for matter as opposed to spirit.^[2][5] In one passage Dante says that philosophy has wisdom as its subietto materiale and love as its form.^[7]

Semantic evolution

Boccaccio already used the adjective for a coarse, clumsy person (1348–1353).^[2] In philosophy, from the 17th century, it was opposed to formale.^[4] Later senses are “bulky” (before 1705) and “actual, real” (1773).^[2] The noun, “material needed for a piece of work”, is first recorded before 1537 in V. Biringuccio, where new materiali are put in flasks to distil.^[2][9]

Phrases of the 19th and 20th centuries set the material against the moral: interessi materiali for money and the means of living, cited from Gioberti in 1833, vita materiale (1842), necessità materiali (1869) and lavoro materiale for physical work (1945).^[2] Derivatives include materialità (14th century) and the colloquial materialone (19th century).^[4]

Timeline

• 1268 – Zingarelli's first date for the word.^[8]
• 1304–1308 – Dante uses materiale in the Convivio.^[2][5]
• 1348–1353 – Boccaccio uses it for “coarse, crude”.^[2]
• Before 1537 – Biringuccio uses the noun materiale “material”.^[2]
• 1773 – The sense “actual, real” is recorded.^[2]
• 1833 – Gioberti writes of interessi materiali.^[2]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of matter, made of matter: Il mondo materiale obbedisce a leggi fisiche.^[5][6][10]
2. physical, practical, as opposed to spiritual or intellectual: lavoro materiale, bisogni materiali.^[5][6][10]
3. Actual, real: Non ho avuto il tempo materiale di rispondere. Autore materiale: the person who actually committed a crime, as opposed to the one who ordered it.^[5][6]
4. (philosophy) Concerning empirical content, as opposed to formal.^[10][5]
5. Of a person, coarse, worldly, interested only in material things; of things, rough, crude.^[5][10]

Noun

1. material: a substance, raw or partly worked, used for making things: materiale da costruzione.^[5][6][10]
2. The tools, equipment or documents needed for an activity: Ho raccolto molto materiale per la mia tesi.^[10][6]
3. (uncommon) A coarse person.^[10]

Word family

• materialmente
• immateriale
• materialismo
• materialista
• materialistico
• materialità
• materializzare
• materialone

Related words

• materia
• Latin māteria
• Spanish madera

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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
3. ^ a b Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
4. ^ a b c d e Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 2389
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
6. ^ 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
7. ^ a b c Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
8. ^ a b Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
9. ^ Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 9, 925
10. ^ a b c d e f g Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse