ritorcere

Forms

ritorcere (first-person singular present ritòrco, first-person singular past historic ritòrsi, past participle ritòrto, auxiliary avére)^[1] Old and dialect forms include ritòrciare and ritòrzere.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *retorcere, the popular form of classical Latin retorqueō (“to twist back”).^{[3][4][5][6][7][8][9]} DELI and GDLI call it a learned word in a popular shape.^[10][2] Wiktionary also allows a formation from Italian ri- + torcere.^[1] The Latin verb is formed re- (“back”) and torqueō (“to twist”), whose popular form gave torcere.^[3][11] In Italian the prefix added the sense “again”, beside the Latin “back”.^[10]

The same word is French retordre, Occitan retorser, Catalan retorcer, Spanish retorcer and Portuguese retorcer.^[3] Meyer-Lübke adds Sardinian redorkere and gives the sense “to twist yarn” for the Ibero-Romance forms.^[9]

The Latin past participle retortus soon became a noun, especially in the feminine, a withy or rope, which spread through Italy, Catalonia and Gallo-Romance as ritorta.^[10] A late form of the participle, retorsus, gave Medieval Latin retorsio, taken up by medieval lawyers, and Italian ritorsione.^[10][3]

The simple Latin verb goes back to Proto-Italic *torkʷ-eie- and Proto-Indo-European *torkʷ-eie- (“to twist”).^[12]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI's first records are all in Dante, before 1321, for twisting again or hard, for twisting in the opposite direction, and, reflexively, for turning back.^[10] In the Purgatorio Dante turns his eyes back: li occhi torsi; / e nulla vidi, e ritorsili avanti, “I turned my eyes, saw nothing, and turned them forward again”.^[4][7] In the Paradiso some say the moon si ritorse, turned back, at the Passion of Christ.^[13][7]

Semantic evolution

The figurative sense of turning something against the one who started it is old: Tasso writes that anger may turn back on oneself, and Salviati speaks of ritorcere un argomento, to throw an argument back.^[13][8] Alfieri writes of a sword turned back into one’s own breast, nel tuo petto il ritorci.^[5] Today the reflexive is common in this sense: Pirandello writes that everything here si ritorce contro di me.^[5][4]

The noun ritorsione, retorting an accusation or argument, is recorded from 1728.^[10] The textile senses came last: ritorcitura, twisting several threads together, was in Zingarelli in 1965, the verb in this sense in 1970, and ritorto as a noun for twisted yarn in 1949.^[10]

Timeline

• Before 1313 – Ritorta, a twisted withy or rope, is first recorded.^[3]
• Before 1321 – Dante uses ritorcere and ritorcersi.^[10]
• c. 1350 – The participle ritorto “twisted” appears in the Italian translation of Crescenzi.^[10]
• 1556 – Daniele Barbaro calls the coils of a volute ritorti.^[10]
• 1728 – Ritorsione is first recorded, in F. G. Morelli.^[10]
• 1949 – Ritorto is used for twisted yarn in Il Tempo di Milano.^[10]
• 1965 – Ritorcitura enters the Zingarelli dictionary as a textile term.^[10]
• 1970 – The textile sense of the verb enters the Zingarelli dictionary.^[10]

Meanings

Verb

1. To twist again or harder; to wring: Ritorse il panno finché non ne uscì più acqua.^{[14][4][11][5][7][1]}
2. (textiles) To twist several yarns together by ritorcitura.^{[14][4][11][5]}
3. To twist or turn in the opposite direction.^{[4][11][5][7][1]}
4. (figurative) To turn an accusation or argument back against the one who made it, to retort: Ha ritorto l’insulto contro chi l’aveva lanciato.^{[14][4][5][7][1]}
5. ritorcersi: to twist oneself, to writhe;^{[4][11][5][7]} (figurative) to backfire on someone, with contro: La sua bugia gli si è ritorta contro.^{[4][11][5][7]}

Word family

• ritorcitura
• ritorsione
• ritorto
• ritorta
• ritorcimento
• ritorcitoio
• ritorcitrice
• ritorcibile
• ritorcitore
• ritorsivo

Related words

• torcere
• torto
• Latin torqueō

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 16, 961
3. ^ a b c d e Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
4. ^ 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
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
6. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
7. ^ a b c d e f g h Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
8. ^ a b Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 844
9. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
10. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
11. ^ a b c d e f Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
12. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
13. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
14. ^ a b c De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET