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notte

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Pronunciation

Forms

notte f (plural notti, pejorative nottàccia)[1] Old forms include Old Italian nocte and Old Italian notti, and the dialects have note.[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin nox (“night”), from the accusative ⟨noctem⟩.[3][4][5][1] The word survives in every Romance language: French nuit, Occitan nuech, Catalan nit, Spanish noche, Portuguese noite, Sardinian notte, Friulian ñot and Romanian noapte.[4][6][7] The cluster /kt/ of the Latin word was assimilated to /tt/, as in other Tuscan words.[8]

The Latin noun comes from Proto-Italic *nok⁽ʷ⁾ts, Proto-Indo-European *nókʷts.[1] It belongs to the oldest shared vocabulary of the Indo-European languages, with Ancient Greek νύξ (núx), Sanskrit नक्त् (nákt), Lithuanian naktìs, Hittite nekuz (“in the evening”) and Old High German naht (modern German Nacht, English night).[4][9][1] De Vaan notes that verbal forms of the root survive only in Hittite, as neku-zi (“to become night”), so the word for night must be an old root noun.[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

GRADIT dates the word to the second half of the 13th century.[5] DELI's first record is in the Novellino, at the end of the 13th century, for the time from sunset to sunrise.[3] GDLI quotes an older northern form in Pietro da Bascapè (1274): “Partì la lux da tenebria, / partì la nocte dala dia” (he parted the light from the darkness, he parted the night from the day).[2]

Semantic evolution

The figurative sense “darkness”, also of the mind, is recorded in the 14th century in an Italian version of Saint Gregory.[3] Many derivatives are old: nottetempo “by night”, from the Latin phrase noctis tempore, is in Bono Giamboni before 1292, and stanotte “tonight”, from (que)sta notte, is of the second half of the 13th century.[3][4] Notturno, a learned word from Latin nocturnus, is recorded about 1350, and as the name of a languid piece for piano in 1826.[3][4]

Nottola was a name of the bat (before 1400) and of the owl (before 1336), and a wooden latch shaped like a bird's beak was called by the same name from 1350–1366, following a habit, already Latin, of naming latches after animals.[3] The phrase buona notte al secchio “that's the end of it” is Roman: Bruno Migliorini traced it to a sestina of Giggi Zanazzo of 1882.[3] Notte brava, a night of escapades or of hooliganism, appears in the press in 1971, and notturna for a football match played under floodlights in 1970.[10][3][4]

Through the Italian word, the Parlyaree slang of English showmen and performers had nochy “night”.[11]

Timeline

  • Second half of the 13th century – notte is first recorded.[5]
  • 1274 – Pietro da Bascapè writes the form nocte.[2]
  • Before 1292 – Bono Giamboni uses nottetempo.[3]
  • End of the 13th century – The Novellino uses notte for the time between sunset and sunrise.[3]
  • 14th century – The figurative sense “darkness” is recorded.[3]
  • About 1350 – The adjective notturno is recorded.[3]
  • 1826 – Notturno names a piece for piano.[3]
  • 1882 – Giggi Zanazzo's verses give rise to buona notte al secchio.[3]
  • 1970 – Notturna is recorded for a match played at night.[3][4]

Meanings

Noun

  1. night, the part of the day between sunset and dawn, when the sun is below the horizon: Ha piovuto per tutta la notte.[5][12][8]
  2. (often capitalized) Night personified.[5]
  3. The darkness of night; darkness in general.[5][13]
  4. (figurative) A period or condition of ignorance, fear or obscurantism.[5][8]
  5. (figurative) blindness of the body or of the spirit; a clouding of the mind.[5][8]

Interjection

  1. (colloquial) Short for buonanotte, good night.[1]

Word family

  • nottata
  • nottetempo
  • nottola
  • nottolino
  • nottolone
  • notturna
  • notturno
  • nottambulo
  • annottare
  • pernottare
  • pernottamento
  • pernotto
  • stanotte
  • mezzanotte
  • buonanotte

Usage notes

After the name of a day, notte is used without a preposition for the night that follows it: lunedì notte.[12][14] Common phrases include buona notte (or buonanotte), the greeting before going to bed, also used to say that something is over and done with, giorno e notte “continuously”, passare la notte in bianco “to have a sleepless night”, and peggio che andar di notte “from bad to worse”.[15][13][14]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 11, 588
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
  4. ^ a b c d e f g 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. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
  7. ^ Körting, Gustav (1907), Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch: etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Hauptsprachen, 3rd ed., Paderborn: Schöningh
  8. ^ a b c d Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
  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. ^ Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. Supplemento 2009
  11. ^ Stammerjohann, Harro, et al. (2008), Dizionario di italianismi in francese, inglese, tedesco, Firenze: Accademia della Crusca; online at difit.italianisticaonline.it
  12. ^ a b Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
  13. ^ a b Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
  14. ^ a b Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
  15. ^ Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana