percepire

Forms

percepire (first-person singular present percepìsco, first-person singular past historic percepìi, past participle percepìto, auxiliary avére)^[1] An old infinitive percepere and an old past participle percetto are recorded.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin percipere (“to gather, receive; to perceive”), a learned word.^[4][5][6][7] That verb is formed from Latin per- + capiō (“to take”).^[4][5][8] Italian moved it from the third to the fourth conjugation;^[7][9] Treccani compares concepire and suggests the influence of the Latin perfect and past participle percēpī and perceptus.^[7][9] Devoto saw a crossing with capire.^[10]

The Latin verb was also inherited: Old French perceivre (12th century; modern French percevoir), Occitan percebre, Catalan percebre, Spanish percibir, Portuguese perceber and Romanian pricepe.^[6][11][5] Old northern Italian had Old Italian percever, and Wiktionary calls the Italian verb semi-learned beside this inherited Old Italian form.^[11][1][6] The DEI considers the modern sense of the Italian word a Gallicism.^[6]

De Vaan reconstructs Proto-Italic *kap-i- for the simple verb, from Proto-Indo-European *kh₂p-i- or from a non-Indo-European *kap-i- “to seize”, and compares Ancient Greek κάπτω (káptō, “to gulp down”).^[12]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in Domenico Cavalca, who died in 1342, with the sense “to take in the outside world through the senses or the mind”.^[4][7] Tommaseo cites Cavalca's play on words: Più beata fu Maria percependo la fede di Cristo, che concependo la carne di Cristo, “Mary was more blessed in receiving the faith of Christ than in conceiving the flesh of Christ”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The noun percezione is older than the verb: DELI finds it in Dante in 1293–94.^[4] The sense “to receive, collect (money)” appears in G. B. De Luca, before 1683, and in Pietro Giannone, before 1748, and a Venetian form percipire is in a resolution of the Venetian Senate of 1783.^[4] The DEI dates the sense “to draw a salary” to 1829.^[6] The derivative percettore had the sense “tax collector” in southern Italy (perceptore, 1491).^[4]

In philosophy the verb names the first act of knowing: Rosmini asks Quali sono gli enti che l'uomo percepisce?^[3] The family grew with percettibile (before 1424), impercettibile (16th century, from Medieval Latin), percettivo (17th century, after French perceptif) and percepibile (1871).^[4][5]

Timeline

• 1293–1294 – Dante uses the noun percezione.^[4]
• Before 1342 – Domenico Cavalca uses percepire.^[4]
• Before 1424 – Percettibile is recorded.^[4]
• 1491 – Perceptore “tax collector” is recorded in the Aragonese code.^[4]
• Before 1683 – G. B. De Luca uses the verb for receiving money.^[4]
• 1871 – Percepibile is recorded by Tommaseo–Bellini.^[4]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive) To perceive, become aware of through the senses: percepire un odore di bruciato.^[7][13][14]
2. (transitive) To feel inwardly: percepire un senso di disagio.^[7][13]
3. (transitive) To sense, intuit, often vaguely: Percepivo che qualcosa non andava.^[7][13][15]
4. (transitive, administrative) To receive or collect by right: percepire una pensione.^[7][13][9]

Word family

• percezione
• percettibile
• impercettibile
• percettivo
• percettore
• percepibile
• percettività

Related words

• concepire
• percepimento
• percetto
• percipiendo
• recepire
• capire
• percipiente
• Latin percipiō
• French percevoir

Usage notes

The verb is conjugated with -isc- (percepisco).^[13][14] Its present participle is replaced by the Latinate percipiente.^[9]

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
3. ^ a b 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 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
5. ^ a b c d Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b c d e Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 2845
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. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ 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)
10. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier, p. 324
11. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
12. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
13. ^ 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
14. ^ a b Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
15. ^ Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli