polposo

Forms

polposo (feminine polposa, masculine plural polposi, feminine plural polpose)^[1] The oldest record has the form Old Italian polpuso.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Late Latin pulpōsus (“fleshy”), formed from Latin pulpa (“flesh; pulp”) with the suffix -ōsus.^{[3][4][5][1][6]} By surface analysis it is also polpa with the suffix -oso.^[1]

Meyer-Lübke lists the same Late Latin adjective behind Sicilian purpusu, Sardinian prupozu, Spanish pulposo and Portuguese polposo.^[7]

The Latin noun first meant the fleshy parts of a body, the best part of the meat.^[8] De Vaan reconstructs Proto-Italic *pelpā “meat”, because the genitive Umbrian pelmner “of meat” shows that the first vowel was once *e*.^[8][1] Its further origin is uncertain.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in a Sabine translation of Lorenzo Rusio's treatise on horse medicine from the end of the 14th century, in the form polpuso, said of an animal's body with strong, well-developed muscles.^[2] Applied to fruit, “rich in pulp”, the word appears about 1525 in Antonio Pigafetta.^[9]

Semantic evolution

DELI rejects an earlier record in the translation of Mesue that the Crusca dictionary and Tommaseo cite, following Volpi's study of forged quotations.^[9][10] Pigafetta describes a fruit “like a pine cone, yellow outside and white inside, and pulpy like a pear”, and the 16th-century writers on agriculture and food, Mattioli and Romoli, use the word of citrons and plums.^[11]

The word was later extended to leaves and herbs rich in tissue and sap, to substances with the consistency of pulp, and to wine of good body.^[11][12][13] In literary use it describes the human body, especially a woman's, as plump and firm.^[12][14]

Timeline

• Late 14th century – polpuso is used of a muscular animal body in a Sabine treatise on horse medicine.^[2]
• 1499 – Zingarelli's date of first record.^[15]
• About 1525 – Antonio Pigafetta uses polposo of fruit rich in pulp.^[9]
• 1563 – the date of first record in Nocentini, the GRADIT and Devoto–Oli.^[3][12][5]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of fruit or edible animals, rich in pulp or flesh; fleshy: una pera polposa e matura.^{[12][5][13][16]}
2. Having the consistency of pulp.^{[12][13][15][17]}
3. (oenology) Of wine, dense and full-bodied.^[12][13][16]
4. (literary) Of the human body, especially a woman's, or of its parts, plump and firm; shapely.^[12][14][15]

Word family

• polposità

Related words

• polpa
• Latin pulpa

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
3. ^ a b Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
4. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier
5. ^ 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
6. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
8. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
9. ^ a b c Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
10. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
11. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
12. ^ a b c d e f g De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
13. ^ a b c d Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
14. ^ a b Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
15. ^ a b c Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
16. ^ a b Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
17. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli