nome

Forms

nome m (plural nomi or (Old Italian) nómora)^[1] Old forms include nomo and nuòme;^[2] Old Sicilian has nomo and nomu.^[3] Old Italian had the plurals nomina, a relic of the Latin neuter plural, and nómora.^[3][2][1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin nōmen (“name”).^[4][5][6][1] The word is panromance: French nom, Occitan nom, Catalan nom, Spanish nombre, Portuguese nome, Sardinian lùmene and Romanian nume.^[5][7][8] DELI classes it with its learned derivatives, and Meyer-Lübke observed that the noun often shows the open vowel of book words;^[4][7] Wiktionary gives both /ˈno.me/ and /ˈnɔ.me/.^[1]

The Latin word belongs to the shared Indo-European vocabulary, with cognates such as Sanskrit नामन् (nā́man), Ancient Greek ὄνομα (ónoma), Hittite lāman, Old Church Slavonic имѧ (imę), Gothic 𐌽𐌰𐌼𐍉 (namō) and Old Irish ainm.^[5][9] The reconstruction of the root is disputed: de Vaan sets out Proto-Indo-European *h₃néh₃-mn̥, while Wiktionary gives *h₁nómn̥ and explains the Latin long vowel by association with gnōscō (“to know”).^[9][1] Its grammatical sense “noun” was modelled on the Greek word.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in an early 13th-century translation of the rhetoric of Rainerio da Perugia, in the sense of the word by which a person, animal or thing is called;^[4][5] Nocentini dates the word to the end of the 12th century.^[4][5] The sense “personal name” is in the Novellino at the end of the 13th century.^[4]

Semantic evolution

Domenico Cavalca, before 1342, uses the word for “fame, reputation”, the sense of farsi un nome (to make a name for oneself).^[4][6] Dante draws on the grammarians' opposition of name and thing: Fai come quei che la cosa per nome / apprende ben (you do as one who grasps a thing well by its name, Paradiso 20).^[10] By metonymy the word came to mean a family or lineage and a famous person: i grandi nomi della musica.^[6]

The family is old: nomare “to name” is in Dante, nomea “reputation” in Matteo Villani, and nomignolo “nickname” in Francesco da Buti (before 1406); Giovanni Alessio derived the last from a Latin *nōmineus.^[4] Nomare lived on in nineteenth-century books, and Silvio Pellico still uses it.^[4] In computing the GDLI's supplement records nome utente, “username”.^[10]

Timeline

• Early 13th century – The word appears in a translation of Rainerio da Perugia.^[4]
• End of the 13th century – The Novellino uses it for a personal name.^[4]
• Before 1321 – Dante uses nomare.^[4]
• Before 1342 – Domenico Cavalca uses it for “fame”.^[4]
• Before 1406 – Nomignolo is recorded.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. name: the word or words by which a person, animal, thing or idea is called: il nome di questo fiore.^[6][11][12]
2. (grammar) noun: nome proprio, nome comune.^[6][11][13]
3. First name; also the full name of a person: scrivete nome e cognome.^[6][14]
4. Family, lineage: porta un nome nobile.^[6]
5. A famous person: un grande nome del cinema.^[6]
6. reputation, fame: ha nome di buon medico.^[6][4]

Word family

• nomare
• nomea
• nomignolo

Related words

• cognome
• nominale
• nominare
• soprannome
• nomina
• nominativo
• nomenclatura
• prenome
• Latin nōmen

Usage notes

Common phrases are a nome di (on behalf of), in nome di (in the name of), di nome (by name, in name only), nome d'arte (stage name) and chiamare le cose col loro nome (to call a spade a spade).^[6][13][12]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
3. ^ a b Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 2595
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n 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 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. ^ Körting, Gustav (1907), Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch: etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Hauptsprachen, 3rd ed., Paderborn: Schöningh
9. ^ 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
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. 11, 513
11. ^ a b Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
12. ^ a b Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
13. ^ a b Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
14. ^ Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana