mollica

Forms

mollica f (plural molliche)^[1] Old Italian forms include molica, mulica, mullica and mollicha.^[2] DEI notes the southern type muddica.^[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *mollīca, from Latin mollis (“soft”), for the soft part of bread.^{[4][5][6][7][1]} GRADIT, Sabatini–Coletti and DEI see the influence of Latin mica (“crumb”) on the form, and DEI and the GDLI compare Pliny's phrase mollia panis (“the soft of the bread”).^[5][8][3][9] Körting reported an older proposal by Caix, from a diminutive Latin *molecula of moles (“mass”).^[10]

The same word is Sicilian muḍḍica.^[1][11]

mollis goes back to Proto-Italic *moldu- and Proto-Indo-European *ml̥du- (“soft”): an old u-stem adjective remade as an i-stem in Latin.^[12][1] It is related to Sanskrit मृदु (mṛdú, “soft, mild”).^[1][13]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in anonymous 13th-century poems from Urbino.^[2] DEI also dates it to the 13th century.^[3] DELI's first record of the plural molliche “crumbs” is in the letters of Saint Catherine of Siena, before 1380, and of the sense “the soft inside of bread” in the Fasciculo di medicina volgare of 1494.^[14][5]

Semantic evolution

Both senses, the soft inside of a loaf and a crumb or tiny amount of bread, are already in Old Italian.^[2] Early recipes and remedies use it: the Fasciculo di medicina volgare puts bread mollica into a juice of fennel and parsley, and Caterina Sforza's book of experiments has it soaked in water to wash the hands and face.^[9] Ruscelli rubbed out ink lines with a little bread mollica.^[9][15]

The diminutive mollicola “crumb” is old, and mollicume is a later formation.^[16] Old senses now gone are “blunder”, as in Lasca's molliche tanto orrende e strane, ironic “a great quantity”, and “nothing at all” in negative phrases.^[15][17] In Apulia the word names a fine-grained limestone tufa, soft enough to saw.^[5][7]

Timeline

• 13th century – Anonymous poems from Urbino have the first record.^[2]
• Before 1380 – Saint Catherine of Siena uses the plural for “crumbs”.^[14][5]
• 1494 – The Fasciculo di medicina volgare uses it for the soft inside of bread.^[14][9]
• 16th century – Smollicare is formed with the intensive prefix s-.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. The soft inside of a loaf of bread, within the crust: Per le polpette uso la mollica ammollata nel latte.^[5][6][8][1]
2. (chiefly in the plural) A crumb, and (figurative, literary) a trifle.^[5][8][17]
3. A fine-grained tufa of Apulia, used especially for partition walls.^[5][6][7]

Word family

• mollicola
• mollicume
• smollicare

Related words

• molle
• mica
• Latin mollis

Usage notes

The standard stress is mollìca.^[8][18] The stress mòllica, heard mainly in Lombardy, is considered incorrect.^[7][8][18] Mollica and midolla are synonyms for the inside of the loaf.^[8]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
3. ^ a b c Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 2489
4. ^ a b Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
5. ^ a b c d e f g h De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
6. ^ 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
7. ^ a b c d Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
8. ^ a b c d e f Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
9. ^ a b c d Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
10. ^ Körting, Gustav (1907), Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch: etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Hauptsprachen, 3rd ed., Paderborn: Schöningh
11. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
12. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
13. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
14. ^ a b c Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
15. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
16. ^ Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 672
17. ^ a b Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
18. ^ a b Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli