oppure

Etymology

It is a compound from Italian o + pure, with the consonant doubled after ⟨o⟩.^[2][3][4] The conjunction o continues inherited from Latin aut (“or”), which survives in a popular form in all the Romance languages.^[5] Lombard opur and Piedmontese opura are formed in the same way.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI's first record is Bartolomeo da San Concordio, who died in 1347, with the disjunctive sense “or, or instead”: “Se io degli studi delle parti … volessi dire singularmente oppure in somma” (if I wished to speak of the parties' pursuits one by one or all together).^[2][4]

Semantic evolution

For a long time the word was written either as one word or as two, o pure.^[6][7] Tommaseo advised writing it apart when pure means “simply, only” and joined when it is only an intensive, as in ovvero, and observed that in speech oppure was by then more common than ovvero and more consistently disjunctive.^[8] The sense “otherwise, or else” is recorded in Moravia in 1957.^[2]

Timeline

• Before 1328 – Zingarelli's date for the word.^[9]
• Before 1347 – Bartolomeo da San Concordio uses oppure.^[2]
• 1861–1879 – Tommaseo–Bellini discusses writing it as one word or two.^[8]
• 1957 – Moravia uses it for “otherwise”.^[2]

Meanings

Conjunction

1. or, or else, a stronger form of o that marks an alternative or a contrast: Prendi il treno oppure la corriera?^{[10][11][6][1]}
2. otherwise, or else, if not: Sbrigati, oppure perderai l'autobus.^{[10][6][9][1]}
3. At the start of a sentence, introducing another possibility or suggestion: Oppure potremmo restare a casa.^[9][3][7]

Related words

• pure
• eppure
• o
• ovvero

Usage notes

Ti piace oppure no? shows the common pairing with no in questions.^[11]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
3. ^ a b Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
4. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
5. ^ Pfister, Max; Schweickard, Wolfgang; Prifti, Elton (eds.) (1979–), Lessico Etimologico Italiano, Wiesbaden: Reichert; online at lei-digitale.it, p. 3, 2568
6. ^ a b c Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
7. ^ a b Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
8. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
9. ^ a b c Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
10. ^ a b De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
11. ^ 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