piviere

Forms

piviere m (plural pivieri)^[1] Old forms include Old Italian pievere and the plural Old Italian pivieri.^[2] Older Italian also had peviere.^[3] Oudin's dictionary records pivaro and piviero, and the Venetian forms are pivaro and pivièr.^[4]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Old French plovier, the Old French form of French pluvier, recorded as ⟨plovier⟩ from the early 12th century and as ⟨pluvier⟩ from 1530.^{[5][6][2][1][7]} The French word comes from Latin pluvia (“rain”), because the bird arrives in the rainy season.^[5][7][8] GRADIT links the name to its passage in winter.^[6]

Nocentini instead sets up a Romance formation, Vulgar Latin *pluviārius (“of the rain”), a derivative of pluvia: popular belief made the bird's arrival with the rains into a cause of the rain itself.^[9] Meyer-Lübke also lists the Italian word among the outcomes of *plūviarius, beside Friulian ploe, Old French plouvier and French pluvier.^[10] Prati gives a popular Latin *plovārius, from *plovere (“to rain”).^[4] Devoto–Oli, Treccani and the GDLI leave the matter open and suggest a derivative of piova, the old word for rain.^[11][12][3]

Southern dialect forms such as Neapolitan peliere and Messinese pileri are borrowings of the French word.^[10]

Latin pluvia is the feminine of pluvius (“rainy”).^[1] It belongs with pluō (“to rain”), from Proto-Indo-European *pleu- (“to swim, float”), used of pouring rain.^[13]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first Italian record is in a Florentine text of 1310, Zucchero's translation of Aldobrandino da Siena's book on health, where the word names the plover, a wading bird.^[5][2] A Medieval Latin piverius at Parma in 1316 may mean the bird, but DELI notes that it may instead be the parish word.^[5] The record in the Libro della cura delle malattie, quoted by the Crusca and by Tommaseo, is a forgery.^[5]

Semantic evolution

The word has kept its meaning, the common name of several birds of the plover family.^[2][6] In the 14th century Simone Prudenzani lists pevieri among the dishes of a banquet, and Tommaseo records the saying piviere, boccon da cavaliere (“the plover, a morsel for a knight”), because the bird is good to eat.^[3][14] Francesco Redi described its intestines in the 17th century.^[3]

Modern names distinguish several species: piviere dorato (golden plover), piviere tortolino or piviere solitario (dotterel) and piviere minore.^[6][12] The derivative pivieressa names a related shore bird.^[5]

Timeline

• 1310 – Piviere is recorded in a Florentine version of Aldobrandino da Siena.^[5][2]
• 1316 – Medieval Latin piverius appears at Parma, perhaps in this sense.^[5]
• 14th century – Prudenzani names pevieri among the dishes of a meal.^[3]
• c. 1440 – Zingarelli dates the word from about this year.^[15]
• 1827 – Pivieressa is recorded in Paolo Savi.^[5]

Meanings

Noun

1. (zoology) plover: any of several small migratory wading birds of the family Charadriidae, with a short bill, long pointed wings and three toes, found in marshes and along coasts and rivers: piviere dorato (golden plover).^{[6][7][12][1]}

Word family

• pivieressa
• pivierino

Related words

• pioggia
• piova
• French pluvier
• Latin pluvia

Usage notes

A separate piviere (old pioviere), formed from pieve with the suffix -iere, meant the district under the jurisdiction of a parish priest and the people of that parish.^[6][7][12] The TLIO records it in a Florentine document of 1274, and Dante uses it: sarieno i Cerchi nel piovier d’Acone (“the Cerchi would be in the parish of Acone”).^[2][12] Compare Medieval Latin pleberius (Orvieto, 1334).^[16] It is now obsolete or Tuscan.^[15][16]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
3. ^ a b c d e Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 13, 610
4. ^ a b Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 785
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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 De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
7. ^ a b c d Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
8. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
9. ^ Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
10. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
11. ^ 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 d e Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
13. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
14. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
15. ^ a b Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
16. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 13, 611