Etymologically
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pista

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Pronunciation

Forms

pista f (plural piste)[1]

Etymology

It is probably a southern variant of pesta (“footprint, track”), a noun formed from the verb pestare (“to pound, trample”).[2][3][4][5][1] The verb is inherited from Late Latin pistāre (“to pound”), an intensive of pīnsō (“to pound, crush”).[2][3][1]

The word was borrowed as French piste, where it came to mean the track of a horse and then the course of a racetrack, and French gave it back to Italian with these new senses.[2][3][6][1] DEI gives the old sense “track”, a southern form also found in Neapolitan and Calabrian, a numbered entry of its own, apart from the modern sense “racecourse”, which it takes from French.[7] Nocentini adds that Spanish pista comes from Italian.[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI's first record is pista del piede, “footprint”, in Sachella (1440–1447), and GRADIT dates the word to before 1447.[2][4][8] The sense is a track or print.[2]

Semantic evolution

Antonio Cammelli, who died in 1502, wrote pista de' calci for the marks of kicks, and the word appears in Oudin's dictionary in 1640.[2] DEI finds it in the Neapolitan horseman Federico Grisone (1550) and in Benedetto Castelli (1660).[7] In French piste took the senses of a horse's track (1559), a ring for riding exercise (1584) and later a racecourse (1860).[8][2]

Italian then took these senses back: Petrocchi's dictionary has the beaten earth of horse races in 1891, a cycling track is recorded in 1901, pista for an airport runway in 1936, pista da ballo “dance floor” in 1950 and the sound track of a film in 1956, after French piste sonore (1949).[2] The figurative sense of a lead followed by investigators belongs to the same family of tracks and traces.[4][6]

Timeline

  • 1440–1447 – Sachella writes pista del piede.[2]
  • 1550 – Federico Grisone uses the Neapolitan pista.[7]
  • 1640 – Oudin's dictionary lists pista.[2]
  • 1860 – French piste means the course of a racetrack.[2]
  • 1891 – Petrocchi records pista for a horse-racing track.[2]
  • 1901 – A cycling track is called pista.[2]
  • 1936 – Pista is used for an airport runway.[2]
  • 1950 – Pista da ballo is recorded.[2]
  • 1956 – The sense “sound track” is recorded.[2]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A track, trail of prints: I cani seguivano la pista della volpe.[4][6][1]
  2. (figurative) A lead, a line of inquiry based on clues: La polizia segue una nuova pista.[4][6][1]
  3. A path or dirt track made by frequent passage: una pista nella savana.[4][5][6]
  4. A racetrack or circuit for horse, motor, cycle or foot races: Il ciclista ha fatto un giro di pista.[4][5][6]
  5. A ground or rink for sports and entertainment: pista di pattinaggio, pista da ballo (dance floor), pista del circo (circus ring).[4][5]
  6. A ski run, graded blue, red or black by difficulty.[4][5][6]
  7. (aviation) A runway: pista di volo, pista di rullaggio (taxiway).[5][6]
  8. A sound track or recording track on a tape or film.[6][2][1]
  9. (slang) A line of cocaine.[9][1]

Word family

  • pistaiolo
  • pesta
  • pestare
  • pesto
  • French piste

Usage notes

Pista ciclabile is a cycle lane and fuori pista off-piste skiing.[4][5] The exclamation pista! means “make way!”.[1] The GDLI records a separate obsolete pista, a flatfish, an alteration of Latin psetta.[10]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j 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 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 Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
  5. ^ a b c d e f g Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
  6. ^ 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
  7. ^ a b c Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 2952
  8. ^ a b Stammerjohann, Harro, et al. (2008), Dizionario di italianismi in francese, inglese, tedesco, Firenze: Accademia della Crusca; online at difit.italianisticaonline.it
  9. ^ Wikizionario (Italian Wiktionary), it.wiktionary.org
  10. ^ Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 13, 570