raggiare

Forms

raggiare (first-person singular present ràggio, first-person singular past historic raggiài, past participle raggiàto, auxiliary avére)^[1] The old poetic form is Old Italian raiare, used by Dante (raia).^[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin radiāre (“to emit rays, shine”), a verb formed from radius (“ray”).^[5][6][7][1] It is the popular form: the Latin group /dj/ became the voiced affricate written ⟨ggi⟩, the regular Tuscan outcome, whereas the learned radiare keeps the Latin shape.^[8][1]

The same verb is French rayer, Occitan raiar, Catalan rajar, Spanish rayar and Portuguese raiar.^[5][9] Outside Italian the meaning often moved away from light: the French verb means to stripe or scratch, the Spanish one to strike out, and the Catalan one to flow.^[9]

The origin of the Latin noun is unclear: de Vaan doubts the old link with rādīx (“root”), since the meanings differ.^[10][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI's first record is in Dante's Purgatorio (1313–1319), where the word means “to send out rays”: the sun, raggiando, turned the whole western sky white.^[11][6][12] DEI and Zingarelli date the verb to the 13th century.^[13][14]

Semantic evolution

Dante also used it for “to shine” and, transitively, for “to cast rays on, illuminate”, both before 1321.^[11][12] About 1332 Alberto della Piagentina used it of light spreading out.^[11] The present participle raggiante dates from the early 14th century.^[5]

From the 19th century the verb is also scientific, for heat and other radiation that spreads.^[13][14] Figuratively one raggia di gioia, “beams with joy”.^[8][15][1] Most uses other than the scientific one are now literary.^[6][14]

Timeline

• 1313–1319 – Dante uses raggiare “to send out rays” in the Purgatorio.^[11][12]
• Before 1321 – Dante uses it for “to shine” and transitively for “to illuminate”.^[11]
• Before 1332 – Alberto della Piagentina uses it of light spreading out.^[11]
• 1800s – The verb enters scientific use for radiation.^[13]

Meanings

Verb

1. (literary) Of the sun or other bodies, to send out rays; by extension, to shine or sparkle.^[6][14][3]
2. (figurative) To beam with a feeling: raggiava di gioia, she was beaming with joy.^[8][15][2]
3. (physics) Of light, heat or radiation, to spread out, radiate.^[14][8][15]
4. (transitive, literary) To give off as rays; to shed (light or a feeling).^[6][14][3]
5. (transitive, poetic) To illuminate, irradiate.^[6][14][15]

Word family

• raggiante
• raggiamento
• irraggiare

Related words

• raggio
• radiare
• Latin radiō

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
3. ^ a b c Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
4. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
5. ^ a b c Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b c d e f De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
7. ^ Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
8. ^ a b c d Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
9. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
10. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
11. ^ a b c d e f Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
12. ^ a b c Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
13. ^ a b c Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 3197
14. ^ a b c d e f g Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
15. ^ a b c d Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli