pollastra

Forms

pollastra f (plural pollastre, masculine pollastro)^[1] Old forms include Old Italian polastra and pullastra.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Late Latin pullastra (“young hen”), formed from pullus (“young animal; chick”) with the suffix -aster.^{[3][4][5][1][6]} The masculine pollastro is recorded earlier, as Medieval Latin pollaster at Padua in 1162 and in Italian from 1231–1262.^[7][3] GRADIT derives the masculine from the feminine.^[3] The word belongs to the family of pollo.^[7][2] The word is Sicilian puddastra in the south.^[1]

The same Latin noun gave French poule (“hen”) (from the feminine), Occitan pol, Catalan poll and Spanish pollo.^[8] Nocentini compares Ancient Greek πῶλος (pôlos, “foal”) and Old High German folo (“foal”), perhaps from the same root as Latin puer (“boy”).^[8] Wiktionary gives two competing etymologies for the Latin noun, the one from Proto-Indo-European *polH- (“young of an animal”) being one of them.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first record is in a Tuscan document from the Mugello of the mid-13th century, which lists a pollastra among dues in kind beside a hen; the sense is a young hen raised for meat.^[2] DELI's first date is 1344, in the Libro della Mensa.^[7]

Semantic evolution

Old Italian texts use the word for the live bird and for the dead or cooked one, in accounts and in medical writing, where the meat of the young hen counts as the most wholesome.^[2] Antonio Pucci complains in a sonnet: “Andrea, you sold me for a pullet, Saturday evening, an old hen” (Andrea, tu mi vendesti per pollastra / sabato sera una vecchia gallina).^[9]

A jocular figurative use for a young woman is already recorded in Old Italian.^[2] DELI dates the modern sense “attractive, naive young woman” to 1947;^[7][10] Zingarelli labels it typical of a certain male language.^[7][10] The masculine pollastro developed the parallel sense of a gullible man before 1449.^[7]

Timeline

• c. 1250 – A Mugello document records a pollastra.^[2]
• 1288 – A Florentine account book lists pollastre and eggs.^[2]
• 1344 – The Libro della Mensa has the word.^[7]
• 1947 – The sense “attractive young woman” is recorded.^[7]

Meanings

Noun

1. A pullet, a young hen; also its meat: pollastra al forno con le patate.^{[3][4][10][1]}
2. (figurative, jocular) An attractive young woman, a chick, often one thought naive.^{[3][4][10][1]}

Word family

• pollastrella
• pollastrina
• pollastrona

Related words

• pollastro
• pollo
• pulcino
• Latin pullus

Usage notes

Diminutives are pollastrella and pollastrina (especially in the figurative sense), the augmentative pollastrona.^[10][5]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
3. ^ a b c d e De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
4. ^ a b c Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
5. ^ a b Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
6. ^ Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 792
7. ^ a b c d e f g h Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
8. ^ a b Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
9. ^ Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
10. ^ a b c d e Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli