pensare

Forms

pensare (first-person singular present pènso, first-person singular past historic pensài, past participle pensàto, auxiliary avére)^[1] An old form is Old Italian penzare.^[2][3] Old Italian forms also include pansare and pemsare.^[4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin pēnsō (“to weigh carefully; to consider”), an intensive verb formed on pēnsum, the past participle of pendō (“to hang; to weigh”).^[5][6][7][1] The meaning “think” grew out of “weigh”, the same shift seen in ponderare.^[6][2] The verb also gave pesare “weigh”, its doublet.^[6][1]

The word did not develop quite like an inherited one: it keeps the cluster ⟨-ns-⟩, which elsewhere became ⟨-s-⟩, as in ⟨pesare⟩.^[6][5] Nocentini explains this by the abstract verb having passed through the written language before it returned to speech.^[6] DELI quotes Migliorini, who counts it among words that are either semi-learned loans of the first millennium or survivals in the speech of the educated classes,^[5] and DEI calls it a learned word.^[2]

The same verb is French penser, Catalan pensar, Spanish pensar and Portuguese pensar;^[6][2] DEI notes that it belongs to Italian and western Romance.^[6][2] Latin ⟨pendō⟩ goes back to Proto-Italic *pend-e/o- (“to hang”); de Vaan connects it, with doubts, with a root for spinning or with a root meaning “fall”.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first record is the Ritmo di Sant'Alessio, a poem from the Marche of the second half of the 12th century.^[4] GRADIT and DELI date the verb to before 1250, when Giacomo da Lentini uses it for keeping one's thoughts fixed on someone.^[7][5] The TLIO's oldest senses include “reflect, meditate”, “believe, judge”, “imagine”, “remember” and, in love poetry, “long for the beloved”.^[4]

Semantic evolution

The infinitive was used as a noun from the 13th century, in the poetry of the Sicilian school and in Patecchio of Cremona: Giacomo da Lentini speaks of lo meo dolce penzare “my sweet thinking”.^[4][3] The sense “consider attentively” is recorded before 1294 in Brunetto Latini, “devise” in Dante, “intend” before 1566 in Annibal Caro, and “provide for, see to” before 1634.^[5]

Pensiero “thought” came into Italian through Old Occitan pensier.^[5] Libero pensatore “freethinker” (1776) is a calque of French libre penseur (1763), itself a calque of English freethinker.^[5] Pensatoio, a joking word for a room for thinking, translates Greek phrontistḗrion, Socrates' “thinking shop” in Aristophanes' Clouds.^[6] The verb passed into the Greek dialects of southern Italy as πενσέω.^[1]

Timeline

• Second half of the 12th century – The Ritmo di Sant'Alessio (Marche) has the verb.^[4]
• Before 1250 – Giacomo da Lentini uses pensare and the noun pensare “thought”.^[5][3]
• Before 1250 – Pensamento “thinking, meditation”.^[5]
• Before 1292 – Pensata “idea” in Bono Giamboni.^[5]
• 1293–1294 – Pensiero in Dante.^[5]
• 14th century – Penzare is recorded.^[2]
• 1776 – Libero pensatore “freethinker”.^[5]

Meanings

Verb

1. To think, use the mind; to reflect: Prima di rispondere, pensaci bene.^[7][9][10]
2. To think of or about someone or something (with a); to remember: Penso spesso alla casa dei nonni.^[7][10][1]
3. To believe, hold an opinion: Penso che domani pioverà.^[4][1][11]
4. To imagine or picture: Pensa a quanto saremo contenti.^[7][4]
5. To intend, plan to do something: Penso di partire a giugno.^[5][10]
6. To see to, look after (with a): Alla cena ci penso io.^[7][10]
7. In the imperative, to draw attention to something surprising: E pensa, non mi ha nemmeno salutato!^[7][9]

Word family

• pensabile
• pensamento
• pensante
• pensata
• pensatoio
• pensatore
• pensoso
• pensosità
• ripensare
• ripensamento

Related words

• pensiero
• pesare
• ponderare
• Latin pēnsō
• French penser

Usage notes

Common phrases are pensarci su “think it over”, pensarci due volte “think twice” and dare da pensare “cause worry”.^[7][11] The noun il pensare “thinking, thought” is literary.^[3]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 2836
3. ^ a b c d Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
4. ^ a b c d e f g Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
6. ^ a b c d e f g h Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
7. ^ 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
8. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
9. ^ 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
10. ^ a b c d Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
11. ^ a b Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli