promanare

Forms

promanare (first-person singular present promàno, first-person singular past historic promanài, past participle promanàto, auxiliary (intransitive) èssere or (transitive) avére)^[1]

Etymology

It is learned: it is borrowed from Late Latin prōmānō (“to flow out”), a compound of prō- (“forward”) and mānō (“to flow, trickle”).^{[2][3][4][5][1]} It belongs with emanare, from the same Latin verb.^[6][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Zingarelli dates the word to 1907;^[4][2][3][7] GRADIT, Devoto–Oli and Sabatini–Coletti give 1932, GRADIT for the transitive sense “to give off, spread”.^[4][2][3][7]

Semantic evolution

The word is literary and not common.^[8][9] The GDLI's quotations for the intransitive sense “to spread out from a source”, usually of a smell, are from Gadda, Levi and Calvino, who wrote of a smell of mould coming from a place.^[9][8] The figurative sense “to derive, have its origin”, of thoughts and images, is found in Croce and Volponi.^[9] Gabrielli also gives a rare figurative “to promulgate (a decree)”.^[5]

Timeline

• 1907 – First record according to Zingarelli.^[4]
• 1932 – The transitive sense “to give off” is recorded.^[2][3]

Meanings

Verb

1. (intransitive, auxiliary essere) To emanate, spread out from somewhere, especially of a smell: dalla cucina promanava un odore di pane.^[2][3][7]
2. (intransitive, figurative) To derive, have its origin.^[2][4][5]
3. (transitive, uncommon) To give off, diffuse.^[2][3][4]

Related words

• emanare
• Latin mānō

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
3. ^ a b c d e f Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
4. ^ a b c d e f g Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
5. ^ a b c Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
6. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier, p. 348
7. ^ a b c Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
8. ^ a b Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
9. ^ a b c Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 14, 583