palanca

palanca¹ beam, plank

Etymology tree of palanca¹

inherited borrowed derived

Ancient Greek φάλαγξ (phálanx)

Latin phalanx

English phalanx

Italian palanca

From the same root · palanca¹

Romanian părângă ← φάλαγξ

Pronunciation

• /paˈlan.ka/^[1]

Forms

palanca f (plural palanche)^[1]

Etymology

The word for the beam is inherited from Vulgar Latin *palanca, a popular form of Latin phalanga (“a length of wood; roller; carrying pole”).^[2][3][4][1] The Latin word, also spelled palanga, is from Ancient Greek φάλαγξ (phálanx, “log, trunk; roller”), taken over in its accusative form.^[2][3][5][1] The Greek word is itself of uncertain origin.^[2][6]

In Latin the word named, among other things, the rollers put under ships or siege engines to move them, and the pole on which heavy loads were carried.^[5] Nocentini starts from the roller used to shift very heavy objects.^[3] GRADIT, DEI and the GDLI see in the Italian form the influence of planca (“plank, board”), which would explain the change of meaning towards “plank”.^[4][7][8] A Venetian document of 1239 has Medieval Latin pallanca,^[2] and palanca for launching ships at Venice (1239) and Bologna (1250), beside palanga at Ravenna (1276).^[7][8]

The same word is found across Romance: French palanche “lever; yoke for carrying buckets”, Occitan palanca and Catalan palanca “footbridge”, Spanish palanca and Portuguese panca “lever, pole”, and Romanian părîngă “pole”.^[3][9] Portuguese also has alavanca “lever”, reshaped after alevantar (“to lift”).^[9] Italian has falanga as the learned doublet, and falange from the same Greek word.^[3][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Before Italian texts, the word is recorded in Medieval Latin documents of Venice from 1239, for a beam or pole used to launch ships.^[2][7] The first Italian record is in Donato degli Albanzani, who died in 1411, in the sense “a large beam or pole”: he tells of a man carrying a palanca who was told, Fatti forte con la spada (“make yourself strong with the sword”).^[2][8][10]

Semantic evolution

From the beam or pole the word passed to other uses of heavy timber.^[2][10] In 1531 Marin Sanudo uses it for a plank laid as a gangway between a boat and the shore, or between two boats.^[2] By 1601 it named a field defence of heavy beams and earth in fortification, and Tommaseo describes it as a palisade of stakes driven into the ground side by side.^[2][10] In Tuscan place names of the type ⟨Palancaia⟩ (⟨Palancaria⟩), recorded from 988, it means a meadow closed with a fence of boards.^[7]

Today the usual sense is the thick fir plank, about four metres long, laid as the walking surface of scaffolding on building sites.^[11][4] Dialects keep other uses: in Neapolitan the pole set under a boat to haul it ashore, in Lucca a stone seat.^[9] Derivatives include palancola and palanchino (1612), an iron bar used as a lever, and spalancare, at first “to take away the bars (of a closure)”, hence “to throw wide open”.^[2][3]

The military sense was borrowed into French as palanque (pallanque, 1624) and into German as Palanke (1734).^[12]

Timeline

• 988 – Tuscan place names of the ⟨Palancaia⟩ type are recorded.^[7]
• 1239 – Medieval Latin pallanca is recorded at Venice.^[2][8]
• 1250 – Medieval Latin palanca is recorded at Bologna.^[8]
• 1276 – Medieval Latin palanga is recorded at Ravenna.^[8]
• Before 1411 – Donato degli Albanzani uses Italian palanca for a beam or pole.^[2][4]
• 1531 – Marin Sanudo uses it for a gangplank between a boat and land.^[2]
• 1601 – A. Tarducci uses it for a defence of beams and earth.^[2]
• 1612 – Palanchino, an iron lever, is first recorded, in Falconi.^[2][2]
• 1624 – French pallanque is first recorded.^[12]
• 1734 – German Palanke is first recorded.^[12]

Meanings

Noun

1. A large, long beam or pole of wood: Spostarono il masso facendo leva con una palanca.^[4][13][6]
2. (building) A thick plank, usually of fir, laid as the walking surface of scaffolding and temporary platforms.^[4][14][15]
3. (nautical) A gangplank between a boat and the quay or between two boats; the same as passerella.^[4][13][14]
4. (military, historical) In old field fortification, a palisade of stakes driven into the ground side by side, sometimes with earth, against sudden raids.^[4][13][14]

Word family

• palanchino
• palancola
• spalancare
• palancato
• impalancato
• palancare

palanca² coin; money

Pronunciation

• /paˈlan.ka/^[1]

Forms

palanca f (plural palanche)^[1]

Etymology

The word for the coin is probably borrowed from Spanish blanca, literally “white”, the name of a Spanish coin recorded from 1438, reshaped after palanca¹.^[2][3][4][1] The GDLI and Sabatini–Coletti explain the name by the silver of which the coin was first struck.^[8][15] DEI also derives it from the Spanish coin, under the influence of the beam word.^[7] The Spanish word is the same as Italian bianca.^[1]

DELI notes that this easy explanation leaves problems: the change of the first consonant, the inserted ⟨a⟩, the late appearance of the word in Italian, and its range, limited to Lombardy and Veneto.^[2] For these reasons Schlösser concluded that the origin is still unknown.^[2] Zingarelli and Gabrielli give the Spanish source only as probable or possible.^[6][16]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI's first record is Fanfani's Tuscan dictionary of 1863, which explains palanca as the Tuscan name for the soldo of the new lira, the five-centesimi piece.^[2] DEI gives the same date, and Nocentini and GRADIT date the word to 1895.^[7][3][4]

Semantic evolution

The coin was a copper piece of one or two soldi used in Liguria, Tuscany and Veneto.^[4][11] In 1905 Panzini lists palanca, palancone and palanchetta as living Lombard and Venetian words for copper coins.^[2] DEI also records Tuscan and Venetian palanca for the ten-centesimi piece (1866) and Calabrian palanga “coin”.^[7] Fanfani himself was told by a correspondent that in Tuscany people said soldo instead.^[8]

From the coin the word came to mean any coin, and in the plural money in general, a sense that took hold in northern Italy.^[3][11] Writers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries use it this way, among them Fucini, De Roberto and D'Annunzio, who counts cinque palanche di bronzo (“five bronze palanche”).^[8]

Timeline

• 1438 – Spanish blanca is first recorded as a coin name.^[2]
• 1863 – Fanfani records Tuscan palanca for the five-centesimi piece.^[2]
• 1866 – Palanca is recorded for the ten-centesimi piece in Tuscany and Veneto.^[7]
• 1895 – The date of first record given by Nocentini and GRADIT.^[3][4]
• 1905 – Panzini lists palanca, palancone and palanchetta as Lombard and Venetian words.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. (numismatics, historical) An old copper coin worth one or two soldi, used in Liguria, Tuscany and Veneto.^[4][14][15]
2. (colloquial, northern Italy, chiefly in the plural) money, cash: Non ho più una palanca in tasca.^[4][13][6]

Word family

• palancone