molle

Forms

molle (plural molli)^[1] The popular variant mollo is also recorded.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin mollis (“soft, tender; pliant”).^[4][5][6][1] The word is found across the Romance languages: Romanian moale, Friulian muel, Old French mol (modern French mou), Occitan mol, Catalan moll, Spanish muelle and Sardinian moḍḍe.^[5][7] Several of them also made a noun from it for a spring, as did Italian molla.^[7]

De Vaan derives the Latin word from Proto-Italic *moldus and Proto-Indo-European *ml̥dus (“soft”).^[8][1] The old ⟨u⟩-stem adjective was remade as an ⟨i⟩-stem through a series of assimilations, and molluscus (“thin-shelled”) keeps the older ⟨u⟩-stem.^[8][1] Cognates include Sanskrit मृदु (mṛdú, “soft, tender”), Welsh blydd (“soft”), Ancient Greek ἀμαλδύνω (amaldúnō, “to weaken”) and Old Church Slavonic младъ (mladŭ, “tender, young”).^[8][5][9][1] Nocentini adds German mild and the English word mild.^[5]

Vulgar Latin *mollīca, the source of mollica, probably arose from a blend of the adjective with mīca (“crumb”);^[4] Pliny already called the soft part of bread mollia panis.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in Restoro d'Arezzo in 1282, with the sense “lacking stiffness or hardness”.^[4][6] Zingarelli dates the word to before 1250.^[10]

Semantic evolution

Most of the modern senses are recorded by 1300: “mild, gentle” in Bono Giamboni, “lacking strength or resolve” in Brunetto Latini, both before 1294, and “bending, pliant” in Giordano da Pisa in 1302–1305.^[4] Dante has the reeds growing on soft mud (sovra 'l molle limo), and Petrarch's “eyes ... wet” (gli occhi tuoi molli) shows the sense “wet, soaked”, which DELI dates from Antonio Pucci, before 1388.^[11][4] As a noun, molle meant “wetness” in Guido Cavalcanti, before 1300, and the phrase mettere in molle, to put something to soak, still uses it.^[4][12]

Physics later defined a corpo molle as one that yields to the slightest pressure.^[11] In phonetics molle describes palatalised consonants, and in physics radiation of low energy.^[6][10]

Derivatives include mollezza (13th century), molliccio (before 1400) and mollica (1494).^[4][5] Molluschi (1792) came through the naturalists' Latin mollusca, used by Jonston in 1650 and adopted by Linnaeus.^[4]

Timeline

• 1282 – Restoro d'Arezzo uses molle, “soft”.^[4][6]
• Before 1292 – Bono Giamboni uses it figuratively for “mild, gentle”.^[4]
• Before 1294 – Brunetto Latini uses it for “lacking strength”.^[4]
• Before 1300 – Guido Cavalcanti uses the noun for “wetness”.^[4]
• 1302–1305 – Giordano da Pisa uses it for “pliant, bending”.^[4]
• Before 1388 – Antonio Pucci uses it for “wet, soaked”.^[4]
• 1891 – The noun “something soft” is recorded.^[4]

Meanings

Adjective

1. soft, yielding to touch or pressure: Questo cuscino è troppo molle per me.^[6][13][12]
2. wet, soaked, drenched (often with di): Era tornato a casa molle di pioggia.^[6][13][14]
3. (figurative) weak, feeble, lacking firmness or energy; too lenient: un carattere molle.^[6][12][10]
4. (literary) Mild, gentle, sweet.^[6][12][10]
5. (literary) Pliant, sinuous; of a movement, loose and relaxed: un'andatura molle.^[6][13][10]
6. (phonetics) Palatalised, of a consonant.^[6][10]
7. (physics) Of radiation, of relatively low energy.^[6]
8. (wine) Lacking body and character.^[10][2]

Noun

1. Something soft: cadere sul molle.^[6][10]
2. Wet, damp ground.^[6][14]
3. The liquid in which something is left to soak, as in mettere in molle, to put to soak.^[12][14]

Word family

• mollezza
• mollica
• molliccio
• mollusco
• mollemente
• molla
• ammollire
• rammollire
• ammollare
• immollare
• mollare

Related words

• mollire
• Latin mollis
• French mou

Usage notes

Molle is also the plural of molla “spring”, and as a plural-only feminine noun it names the fire tongs, an iron tool for picking up embers;^[1][11] Tommaseo explains the name under molla, and older texts also have the form molli.^[1][11] Fixed phrases include tessuti molli (soft tissues), palato molle (soft palate) and pappa molle, a person without character or will.^[6][14][10]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
3. ^ Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 671
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
5. ^ a b c d e Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
7. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
8. ^ 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
9. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ a b c d e f g h i Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
11. ^ a b c d Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
12. ^ a b c d e Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
13. ^ 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
14. ^ a b c d Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana