palude

Forms

palude f (plural paludi)^[1] Old Italian also used the word as a masculine, il palude.^[2][3] The Tuscan form is the masculine padule.^[4][5] The old plural could end in -e.^[6]

Etymology

It is a learned word: it is borrowed from Latin palūs (“marsh, swamp”), from its accusative.^[7][8][9][4] Wiktionary instead treats it as inherited from the same Latin form.^[1] The popular Tuscan form padule comes from the same Latin word with its consonants swapped, as Vulgar Latin *padūle.^{[10][4][11][12]}

DEI notes that the word is well documented in the Medieval Latin of northern Italy from the 7th to the 11th century, together with the diminutive Medieval Latin paludellus and the adjective Medieval Latin paludianus (“marshy”), but is missing from the old place names of Tuscany, where the metathesised form stands instead.^[13][6] It belongs to the Italian and Gallo-Romance area.^[13][14] The same word is Old French palu and Old Occitan palu, Venetian paluo, Friulian palut and Romansh palieu.^[12][10] The metathesised form gave Romanian pădure (“forest”) and Sardinian paule.^[12]

The Latin noun goes back to Proto-Italic *palūd-.^[15] Nocentini compares it with words for “swamp” and “moisture” in Sanskrit and Greek and puts it with the root of Latin pluō (“to rain”) and of Italian piovere.^[10] Devoto found most of the comparisons weak, the Sanskrit one being the least fragile.^[16] De Vaan mentions a link with Baltic words for “swamp” and with the Latin stem of palleō (“to be pale”), but agrees with Schrijver that “grey” and “swamp” are too far apart in meaning.^[15]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI's first record is in Dante, between 1300 and 1310, for a low-lying, unhealthy stretch of land covered with shallow water and plants.^[7] Nocentini and GRADIT date it before 1313.^[10][9] In the Inferno Dante calls the river of the dead la livida palude, “the livid marsh”: Quinci fuor quete le lanose gote / al nocchier de la livida palude.^[9][17]

Semantic evolution

In the Purgatorio Dante uses the masculine: Corsi al palude, e le cannucce e ’l braco / m’impigliar sì ch’i’ caddi, “I ran to the marsh, and the reeds and the mire caught me so that I fell”.^[2][17] The Tuscan padule was used by Giovanni Villani, and Prati finds it in a document of the Codex Cavensis of 952.^[18] Petrarch lists the plural among the places he has had to search: Monti, valli, paludi, e mari e fiumi.^[17]

The literary use for the rivers of the underworld lived on in palude stigia, the water of the Styx.^[9][3] The word also has a figurative sense, a stagnant state of moral or spiritual inertia: Montale wrote of sinking “into a black but not unpleasant swamp”.^[3][9] Set phrases include febbre delle paludi for malaria and gas delle paludi for methane.^[5] Paludismo, malaria, was taken from French paludisme.^[18]

Timeline

• 950 – The Medieval Latin adjective paludianus “marshy” is recorded in northern Italy.^[13]
• 952 – Padule appears in a document of the Codex Cavensis.^[18]
• 999 – The diminutive paludellus is recorded.^[13]
• 1300–1310 – Dante uses palude.^[7]
• Early 14th century – Impaludare is first recorded.^[10]
• c. 1340 – Paludoso appears in the Italian translation of Palladius.^[7]
• Before 1374 – Petrarch uses the adjective palustre.^[7]
• 1754 – Impaludamento is first recorded.^[10]

Meanings

Noun

1. A marsh, swamp or bog: low-lying ground covered with shallow, stagnant water and its typical plants: Per secoli la palude ha portato la malaria nella pianura.^{[9][2][4][8][1]}
2. In the plural with a place name, a whole marshy region: le paludi pontine.^[9][2][4]
3. (literary) The waters of the rivers of the underworld: la palude stigia, the Styx.^[9][2][3]
4. (figurative) A state of stagnation or moral inertia: Il paese è rimasto nella palude dell’indifferenza per anni.^{[9][2][4][8][5]}

Word family

• paludoso
• palustre
• impaludare
• impaludamento
• paludismo
• paludano
• paludesco
• paludale

Related words

• padule
• Latin palūs
• Old French palu

Usage notes

Palude is larger than an acquitrino, which properly names the stagnant water, and a stagno, a smaller sheet of still water.^[8] In Tuscany the masculine padule is used.^[4][5]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
3. ^ 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)
4. ^ a b c d e f g Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
5. ^ a b c d Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
6. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 12, 445
7. ^ 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
8. ^ a b c d Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
9. ^ a b c d e f g h i De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
10. ^ a b c d e f Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
11. ^ Wikizionario (Italian Wiktionary), it.wiktionary.org
12. ^ a b c Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
13. ^ a b c d Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 2738
14. ^ Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
15. ^ 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
16. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier, p. 314
17. ^ a b c Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
18. ^ a b c Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 731