pece

Forms

pece f (plural peci)^[1] Old forms include Old Italian peçe, Old Italian pecie, Old Italian pice and the northern Old Italian pexa.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin pĭcem, the accusative of the Latin word for pitch.^[3][4][5][1] The Latin word lives on across the Romance languages except Romanian: French poix, Occitan petz, Catalan pega, Spanish pez, Portuguese pez, Sardinian pighe and Friulian pes.^[4][6][7] It also passed early into Germanic, as Old High German peh (modern German Pech) and Old English pic, whence the English word pitch.^[4][6]

The Latin word is of Indo-European origin.^[3][4] De Vaan reconstructs Proto-Indo-European *pik- (“pitch”), with Ancient Greek πίσσα (píssa), Lithuanian pìkis and Latvian piķis;^[8][1] Wiktionary gives the root noun as *pī́ts.^[8][1] Devoto finds the root in the Umbrian, Greek, Slavic and Baltic areas.^[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is a Pisan document of the first half of the 12th century, for the black, sticky substance.^[3][2][5]

Semantic evolution

Pitch was above all the material for caulking ships: DEI records pece navale in 1329, and Dante describes the sticky pitch boiled in winter in the Venetian Arsenal to caulk damaged ships (Inferno XXI).^[7][10] Pece greca, colophony, is recorded from the 14th or 15th century, and pece liquida “tar” in the Crescenzi translation.^[4][7][2]

Already in Old Italian the word meant a serious vice or sin.^[2] Petrarch wrote che tutti siam macchiati d'una pece, “for we are all stained with one pitch”, and this sense of a fault or defect is now literary.^[5][11][12] The comparison nero come la pece “black as pitch” is proverbial, and a proverb warns that whoever touches pitch is soiled by it.^[10][13]

Modern technical language uses pece for the residue of distilling tar, with many specifying phrases (pece di Borgogna, pece di carbon fossile), and loosely for tar or bitumen itself.^[5][12][7] Derivatives include impeciare (early 14th century) and pecetta, a sticking plaster and later a makeshift patch (1850).^[4][7]

Timeline

• First half of the 12th century – A Pisan document records pece.^[3][2]
• Early 14th century – Impeciare “to coat with pitch” is recorded.^[4]
• 1329 – Pece navale, ship's pitch, is recorded.^[7]
• 14th century – Pece greca “colophony” appears.^[4][2]
• 1562 – Impeciatura is recorded.^[4]
• 1850 – Pecetta is recorded in the sense of a patch.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. pitch: a black, very viscous substance left from distilling tar, softening with heat, used for waterproofing, insulation and paving; also, loosely, tar.^[5][11][13]
2. (by extension) Any of several similar resinous or bituminous products, named by their source: pece greca (colophony), pece nera (ship's pitch).^[11][13][12]
3. (literary, figurative) A fault, a moral stain or vice.^[5][11][2]

Word family

• impeciare
• impeciatura
• pecetta
• impecettare
• pecioso
• peciaiolo

Related words

• pegola
• Latin pix
• English pitch

Usage notes

Nero come la pece “pitch-black” is used of things, of a gloomy sky, and figuratively of a scowling face or a wicked soul.^[11][13] Essere macchiati della stessa pece means to have the same faults.^[14]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
3. ^ a b c d 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 h i j Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
5. ^ a b c d e f De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
6. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
7. ^ a b c d e f Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 2813
8. ^ 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
9. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier
10. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
11. ^ a b c d e Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
12. ^ a b c Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
13. ^ a b c d Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
14. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli