pasta

Forms

pasta f (plural paste)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Late Latin pasta (“dough; porridge”), recorded in Marcellus Empiricus in the 5th century.^[2][3][1][4] The Late Latin word is from Ancient Greek παστά (pastá, “barley porridge”), the neuter plural of παστός (pastós, “sprinkled, salted”), from πάσσω (pássō, “to sprinkle”).^[3][5][1] DELI gives the Greek plural as “flour with sauce” and calls the verb of uncertain origin;^[2][6][7] GRADIT and the Treccani give the Greek form as πάστη (pástē, “flour mixed with water and salt”).^[2][6][7] Wiktionary and Etymonline trace the Greek verb to Proto-Indo-European *kʷeh₁t- (“to shake”).^[1][8]

The same word is French pâte, Occitan pasta, Catalan pasta, Spanish pasta and Portuguese pasta, and it passed into Irish paist.^[3][9][4] Italian pasticcio continues Vulgar Latin *pastīcium, while pasticceria and pasticciere are French pâtisserie and pâtissier.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first record is in the Milanese poems of Bonvesin de la Riva (13th century), in the sense of a food made of flour and water, sometimes with yeast, to be cooked.^[10] DELI's first record, in Zucchero Bencivenni (1310), is the general sense “soft mass made by dissolving or heating solids”; the sense “flour worked with water into a firm dough” follows in the Libro della Mensa of 1344.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Prati notes that dishes of pasta, in broth or dry, are recorded in Italy from the 13th century.^[11] Already in Old Italian pasta could mean the stuff a person is made of, the human body or one's character, and Boccaccio's uomo di grossa pasta is a coarse man.^[10][11] DELI dates the sense “temperament” to Firenzuola (before 1543), the medicinal paste to Bandello (before 1561) and the plural paste “small cakes” to before 1598.^[2]

Pasta asciutta, boiled pasta served with a sauce rather than in broth, is recorded as paste asciutte in 1871 and written as one word, pastasciutta, from 1931.^[2] English pasta is recorded in 1874 (DIFIT cites an earlier use of 1777), but was not common until after the Second World War;^[8][12] German has Pasta in pharmacy from the 15th century and for food from the 20th.^[8][12]

Timeline

• 13th century – Bonvesin de la Riva uses pasta in his Milanese poems.^[10]
• 1310 – Zucchero Bencivenni uses it for a soft mass.^[2]
• 1344 – The Libro della Mensa uses it for dough.^[2]
• 1468 – Pastone is recorded.^[3]
• Before 1543 – Agnolo Firenzuola uses it for “temperament”.^[2]
• Before 1561 – Matteo Bandello uses it for a medicinal paste.^[2]
• 1777 – DIFIT's earliest English record of pasta.^[12]
• 1871 – Paste asciutte is recorded in the Tommaseo dictionary.^[2]
• 1874 – English pasta is first recorded in the OED.^[8][12]
• 1906 – Pastificio “pasta factory” is recorded.^[3]

Meanings

Noun

1. dough: a mixture of flour, water and other ingredients worked until firm, used for bread, pizza and pastry: Lascia riposare la pasta prima di stenderla.^[6][13][5]
2. pasta: food made of durum wheat flour and water in many shapes, boiled and eaten dry with a sauce or in broth: Stasera mangiamo pasta con le zucchine.^[6][14][5]
3. A small pastry or cake, especially in the plural.^[6][5]
4. A paste of ground ingredients for spreading or seasoning: pasta d'acciughe.^[6]
5. A soft, viscous mass of any material: pasta di legno, pasta dentifricia.^[6][14][15]
6. (pharmacy) A semi-solid medicinal preparation for the skin.^[6][15]
7. (figurative) Nature, character: essere della stessa pasta.^[5][14][10]

Word family

• pastasciutta
• pastaio
• pastella
• pastello
• pastetta
• pasticca
• pastina
• pastone
• pastoso
• pastificio
• impastare
• impasto
• rimpasto

Related words

• pasticcio
• Latin pasta
• French pâte

Usage notes

Avere le mani in pasta means to be involved in an affair, or to know a trade well;^[14][13][16] una pasta d'uomo is a good-natured man.^[14][13][16] A different, old adjective pasta, the feminine of pasto “fed”, comes from Latin pāstus.^[5]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
3. ^ a b c d e Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
4. ^ a b Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 2796
5. ^ a b c d e f Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
6. ^ 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
7. ^ a b Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
8. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
9. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
10. ^ a b c d Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
11. ^ a b Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 748
12. ^ a b c d Stammerjohann, Harro, et al. (2008), Dizionario di italianismi in francese, inglese, tedesco, Firenze: Accademia della Crusca; online at difit.italianisticaonline.it
13. ^ a b c Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
14. ^ a b c d e Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
15. ^ a b Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
16. ^ a b Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana