Etymologically
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questo

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Pronunciation

Forms

questo (feminine questa, masculine plural questi, feminine plural queste)[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *eccum istum (“behold, this one”), from Latin eccum (“here he is!”) and iste (“that (of yours), this”).[2][3][4][1] The first part also survives in ecco, the second in Old Italian esto, which still lived on in Umbria and the Marche, and in the unstressed 'sto of “stamattina” and “stasera”.[5][1][6] DEI thought a source in “eccu iste” more likely than one in “atque iste”, because of Romanian and Provençal forms built with Latin ecce.[5]

The same compound is found across Romance: Old French cist (modern French ce), Occitan cest, Catalan aquest, Spanish aqueste, Sardinian custu, Friulian chest and Romanian acest,[3][6] while Spanish and Portuguese mostly use the simple Spanish este.[6][7]

Latin eccum is ecce (“behold”) joined to a pronoun, probably the accusative “hunc”.[8] iste goes back to Proto-Italic *esto-; its second part is the pronoun Proto-Indo-European *so-, Proto-Indo-European *to-.[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is a charter from Fabriano of 1186, where questo points to someone or something near the speaker in space or time.[2][3][4] A vernacular text from the mountains near Pistoia has Questa cosa sì è de Sancto Marcello (“this thing belongs to San Marcello”).[10]

Semantic evolution

Questo marks what is near the speaker;[11][12] quello marks what is far away, and in Tuscan and literary use codesto marks what is near the listener.[11][12] Dante's Purgatorio has Questa montagna è tale, / che sempre al cominciar di sotto è grave (“this mountain is such that it is always hard at the start, below”).[10]

In expressions of time it names the period now running or just coming (quest'anno, questa sera), and the shortened forms stamattina, stasera and stanotte come from the old esto.[4][12][6] It can refer back to what has just been said, mean “such, of this kind”, and stand for “my” in emphatic references to one's own body.[13][11][4]

Older texts and dialects have many forms: quésso, quisto, quistu.[10] In central and southern Italy a type from “eccu ipse” (quissu) takes over its role, as already in Jacopone and Buccio di Ranallo (quessa at Ancona in 1397); in the north, Friulian, Ladin and Piedmontese have chést and western Emilian cus(t).[5]

Timeline

  • 1186 – First record, in a charter from Fabriano.[2][4]
  • Early 14th century – Dante's Questa montagna è tale in the Purgatorio.[10]
  • 1397 – The southern-type form quessa is recorded at Ancona.[5]

Meanings

Adjective

  1. this, these: of a person or thing near the speaker in space or time: questa borsa è nuova.[4][12][13]
  2. In expressions of time, of the period now running or about to come: quest'estate andiamo al mare.[4][12]
  3. Of someone or something just mentioned or about to be mentioned: questo autore lo studieremo domani.[13][11]
  4. Such, of this kind: con questo traffico faremo tardi.[13][11]
  5. (emphatic) For “my”, with parts of the body: l'ho costruito con queste mani.[4][14]

Pronoun

  1. This one, these ones: prendo questo.[11][1]
  2. This thing, this matter: questo non me l'avevi detto.[1][12]

Usage notes

Questo is set against quello and, in Tuscan and literary Italian, against codesto.[11][12] Common phrases are per questo “that is why”, a questo punto “at this point” and con tutto questo “for all that”.[4][1]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c 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 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 d Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 3178
  6. ^ a b c d Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
  7. ^ Körting, Gustav (1907), Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch: etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Hauptsprachen, 3rd ed., Paderborn: Schöningh
  8. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  9. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
  10. ^ 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, p. 15, 129
  11. ^ a b c d e f g Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
  12. ^ a b c d e f g Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
  13. ^ a b c d Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
  14. ^ Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli