Etymologically
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piacere

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Pronunciation

  • /pjaˈt͡ʃe.re/[1]

Forms

piacere (first-person singular present piàccio, first-person singular past historic piàcqui, past participle piaciùto, auxiliary èssere)[1] Old forms include plaçere, placere, plagere and piagere.[2][3][4][5] Sabatini–Coletti explains plagere as a continuation of Old Occitan plazer.[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin placēre (“to please”).[6][7][2][1] The verb is panromance: French plaire, Occitan plazer, Catalan plaure, Spanish placer, Portuguese prazer, Sardinian piàghere and Romanian plăcea;[7][8] DÉRom reconstructs a Proto-Romance verb meaning “to be to someone's liking”, but notes that it has been losing ground in the Romance languages.[9] DEI considers the Spanish and Portuguese words learned and the southern Italian forms loans from Tuscan.[10] The noun is the same infinitive used as a noun, with parallels in French plaisir, Catalan plaer and Romanian plăcere.[7][8][11]

De Vaan sets up a stem Proto-Italic *plak-ē- and a root Proto-Indo-European *pl(e)h₂k- “to agree, be pleasant”, whose only certain comparison is Tocharian A plāk- (“to agree”); Latin plācō (“to appease”) belongs to the same root.[12] Nocentini traces the root to the family of Latin plānus (“flat”), so that the first sense would be “to be smooth, and so agreeable”,[7] and Devoto describes the Latin verb as originally impersonal, “it is all right”.[13]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI's first record is the form plaçono (they please) in the Ritmo laurenziano, from the end of the 12th century;[6] piacere itself is in Bondie Dietaiuti, in the first half of the 13th century.[6] The sense “to wish” is recorded in 1219 in the Breve di Montieri.[6] As a noun GRADIT dates it before 1243, and DELI's first record of the sense “enjoyment” is the Novellino, at the end of the 13th century.[2][6]

Semantic evolution

In Dante the verb has its modern construction, the thing liked as subject and the person in the dative: “Marzïa piacque tanto a li occhi miei” (Marcia so pleased my eyes, Purgatorio 1).[14] The noun meant enjoyment, will (Novellino), and, from Boccaccio (1353) a favour done to someone;[6] it also named the beauty that arouses love, as in Francesca's words in Inferno 5, “mi prese del costui piacer sì forte”.[2][14] The phrase a piacere “at will” goes back to the 14th century and passed into French.[10]

From Late Latin placibilis came piacevole (before 1294).[6][7] A treno di piacere, a cheap train for outings, was a calque of French train de plaisir, recorded by Panzini in 1931.[15] In psychology the principio del piacere is Freud's pleasure principle,[11][4] and in modern use piacere! is the usual reply on being introduced.[2][4]

Timeline

  • Late 12th century – Plaçono in the Ritmo laurenziano.[6]
  • 1219 – The sense “to wish” in the Breve di Montieri.[6]
  • Before 1243 – GRADIT's date for the noun.[2]
  • First half of the 13th century – Bondie Dietaiuti writes piacere.[6]
  • Late 13th century – The noun “enjoyment” and “will” in the Novellino.[6]
  • 1353 – The noun “favour” in Boccaccio.[6]
  • 1931 – Treno di piacere is recorded by Panzini.[15]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To please, be liked by (with the person liking in the dative, so usually rendered “to like”): a mia nonna piacciono i gialli, mi piace camminare in montagna.[2][11][3]
  2. In the conditional, to like, to wish: mi piacerebbe vedere Lisbona, (jocular) ti piacerebbe!, of something unlikely to happen.[2][11]
  3. To win approval or esteem: il suo modo di fare non mi piace.[2][11][16]
  4. To attract, of a person: quella ragazza gli piace da mesi.[2][11][3]
  5. To seem right, to choose: fai come ti piace, faccio quel che mi pare e piace.[2][17][3]
  6. (impersonal) In wishes: piaccia a Dio, piacesse al cielo!.[2][17]

Noun

  1. pleasure, enjoyment, the satisfaction of a desire or of the senses: leggere con piacere, i piaceri della buona cucina.[2][11][3]
  2. In courtesy formulas, honour, pleasure: è stato un vero piacere rivederti; on being introduced, piacere! “nice to meet you”.[2][11][4]
  3. amusement, leisure: una gita di piacere, prima il dovere, poi il piacere.[2][4][3]
  4. A favour, a kindness: mi faresti un piacere?, per piacere, please.[2][3][16]
  5. Will, choice, in a piacere (at will) and a tuo piacere.[2][3]
  6. (psychology) Pleasure as opposed to pain, in Freud's principio del piacere.[2][11][4]

Word family

Usage notes

The verb takes essere and puts the person who likes in the dative: mi piace (I like it), ci sono piaciuti (we liked them).[11][16] The idioms piaccia o non piaccia (like it or not) and non mi piace said of a cough or a look (it worries me) are common.[17][16]

References

  1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
  4. ^ a b c d e f Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
  5. ^ Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 768
  6. ^ 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
  7. ^ a b c d e Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
  8. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
  9. ^ Buchi, Éva; Schweickard, Wolfgang, eds. (2008–), Dictionnaire Étymologique Roman (DÉRom), Nancy: ATILF, http://www.atilf.fr/DERom
  10. ^ a b Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 2890
  11. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
  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. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier, p. 329
  14. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
  15. ^ a b Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 3884
  16. ^ a b c d Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
  17. ^ a b c Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli