Etymologically
Log in

poppa

History Permalink

Etymology and origin of the Italian word poppa

poppa1 breast

Confidence
Probable
Formation
Inherited
First attested
1271–1275 Fiori di filosafi (Florentine)
Inherited from
Latin *puppa
Ultimate origin
Latin pupa

Pronunciation

Forms

poppa f (plural poppe)[1]

Etymology

The word for the breast is inherited from Vulgar Latin *puppa (“teat, breast”), a popular form of classical Latin pūpa (“girl; doll”).[2][3][4][1] How a word for “girl” came to mean “breast” is not fully clear.[2] Nocentini thinks the Vulgar Latin word already had both senses, as mamma meant both “mother” and “breast”, and calls it imitative.[3] J. Orr (1963) proposed the opposite path: from “breast” to a dummy teat shaped like a little doll, then a rag doll and finally a girl.[2]

The same word is Occitan popa (“nipple”) and Old French poupe (“nipple”), and northern dialects have Lombard popa.[3][5][6] It is a doublet of pupa.[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in the Florentine Fiori di filosafi (1271–1275), in the sense “breast”: a child sleeps sweetly between its mother's breasts until morning.[7][8] DELI's first record is in Bono Giamboni, before 1292, on the Amazons, who burned off the right breast of their girls so that it would not hinder them in shooting.[2][8]

Semantic evolution

Old Italian had dare la poppa “to suckle” and da poppa “unweaned”, and used the word figuratively for nourishment or a source.[7] Dante used it for the chest in general, and in the Purgatorio foretells a ban on the shameless Florentine women who go about “showing the breast with the paps” (mostrando con le poppe il petto).[2][8][9]

The verb poppare “to suck” is recorded before 1348, and later poppante (an infant, from 1840), poppata (a feed, 1871) and poppatoio (a feeding bottle, 1885).[2] The jocular proverb il vino è la poppa dei vecchi calls wine the milk of the old, and poppa di Venere is a group of old peach varieties.[10][9][4]

Timeline

  • 1271–1275 – The word appears in the Florentine Fiori di filosafi.[7]
  • Before 1292 – Bono Giamboni uses it.[2]
  • Before 1321 – Dante uses it for the chest.[2]
  • Before 1348 – Poppare is recorded, in G. Villani.[2]
  • 1840 – Poppante “infant” appears in the Milanese press.[2]
  • 1885 – Poppatoio “feeding bottle” is recorded.[2]

Meanings

Noun

  1. (colloquial) breast, mammella;[4][10][1] dare la poppa, to breastfeed.[4][10][1]
  2. (literary) The chest.[4][10][11]

Word family

  • poppare
  • poppante
  • poppata
  • poppatoio
  • spoppare
  • popputo

poppa2 stern

Confidence
Established
Formation
Inherited
First attested
1296 Compasso da navegare
Inherited from
Latin puppis
Ultimate origin
Latin puppis
Etymology tree of poppa2
inherited borrowed derived
Latin puppis
Italian poppa

Pronunciation

Forms

poppa f (plural poppe)[1]

Etymology

The word for the stern is inherited from Latin puppis (“stern of a ship”), through a Vulgar Latin *puppa with a change of declension.[2][3][1][10] The same word is Occitan popa, which gave French poupe, and Catalan popa, Spanish popa and Portuguese popa.[3][5] Venice had Venetian pope, and DELI thinks the derivatives poppavia and poppiere spread from there.[5][2][12]

The origin of the Latin word is unknown.[13][14][2] Nocentini suggests that its likeness to poppa1 may not be chance but one of the many metaphors that give parts of the body to objects.[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first Italian record is the Compasso da navegare, a sailing guide of 1296, followed by the Pisan sermons of Giordano da Pisa in 1309.[7] Venetian pope is recorded in 1218.[15] Dante uses the word several times, as in the shipwright who works “at the prow or at the stern” (da proda e … da poppa).[2][8]

Semantic evolution

By metonymy the poets used poppa for a whole ship.[4][9] The phrase avere il vento in poppa, to sail before the wind, came to mean “to be in luck”, and in modern use the word also names the tail of an aircraft or airship.[9][16][10] Poppa is also the name of the constellation Puppis.[9]

DIFIT lists French poupe (1246) and German Poppa (1434) as loans from Italian, while Nocentini derives the French word from Occitan.[15][3] Maltese and Turkish borrowed the word.[1]

Timeline

  • 1218 – Venetian pope is recorded.[15]
  • 1296 – Poppa appears in the Compasso da navegare.[7]
  • Before 1321 – Dante uses it.[2]
  • 1434 – German pope is recorded.[15]
  • 1585 – Poppavia appears in T. Garzoni.[2]
  • 1623 – Poppiere, a stern oarsman, appears in G. B. Marino.[2]
  • 1889 – Poppiero is recorded by Guglielmotti.[2]

Meanings

Noun

  1. (nautical) The stern of a ship or boat, opposite the prua: da poppa a prua, along the whole length of the ship.[4][10][9][1]
  2. (literary) A ship.[4][10][11]
  3. The tail of an aircraft; the rear of a vehicle.[4][10][9]

Word family

  • poppavia
  • poppiere
  • poppiero

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k 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 s 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 e f g Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
  5. ^ a b c Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
  6. ^ Körting, Gustav (1907), Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch: etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Hauptsprachen, 3rd ed., Paderborn: Schöningh
  7. ^ a b c d e Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
  8. ^ a b c d Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
  9. ^ a b c d e f g Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
  10. ^ a b c d e f g h i Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
  11. ^ a b Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
  12. ^ Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 796
  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. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  15. ^ a b c d Stammerjohann, Harro, et al. (2008), Dizionario di italianismi in francese, inglese, tedesco, Firenze: Accademia della Crusca; online at difit.italianisticaonline.it
  16. ^ Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli

Related etymologies

Cite this entry

“Poppa.” Etymologically, 10 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/it/poppa. Accessed 10 Nov. 2026.

Last edited on . ·