rivenire

Forms

rivenire (first-person singular present rivèngo, first-person singular past historic rivénni or rivènni, past participle rivenùto, first-person singular future riverrò, auxiliary èssere)^[1] Old forms include revenire and revegnire.^[2]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin revenīre (“to come back”), which Zingarelli calls a learned word.^{[3][4][5][6][7][1]} The Latin verb is formed re- and veniō (“to come”).^[3][5] GDLI and Sabatini–Coletti take it instead as formed in Italy, from Italian ri- + venire, and the 2011 Treccani as one made on the Latin model.^[2][8][9]

The simple Latin verb goes back to Proto-Italic *gʷn-je/o- and Proto-Indo-European *gʷm-ie/o- (“to come”).^[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

Zingarelli dates the first record before 1257, GRADIT to the 13th century.^[3][4] Among GDLI's earliest examples, Iacopone da Todi has Dicete a la mia sposa che dega revenire, “tell my bride that she must come back”, and the Novellino a pilgrim who says “if I do not come back” (s’io non rivenisse).^[2]

Semantic evolution

Dante uses it in the Paradiso: Ne la corte del cielo, ond’io rivegno, “in the court of heaven, whence I come back”.^[5][7][2] It was also used of things coming back, such as the taste of food rising again to the mouth.^[11]

Old Italian had the sense of coming round after a faint: Boccaccio writes of a woman who heaved a great sigh as soon as she came to, and Ariosto has Come Ruggiero in sé fu rivenuto.^[5][7][6] Another old sense was “to come from, to derive”: Alamanni says that from such plants comes so great a crop.^[7] These senses are now archaic, and the verb lives on for coming back and for something that recurs, a pain or a name coming back to mind.^[4][5][3]

Timeline

• Before 1257 – Rivenire is first recorded.^[3]

Meanings

Verb

1. To come again, to come back, to return: Il medico è rivenuto a visitarla nel pomeriggio.^{[4][5][8][3][7][1]}
2. (figurative) To come back, to recur, of a pain or a thought: Le è rivenuta in mente una vecchia canzone.^[4][5][3][7]
3. (archaic) To come round, to regain consciousness, the same as rinvenire: rivenire in sé.^{[4][5][8][3][7][6][1]}
4. (archaic) To derive, to originate, with da.^{[4][5][3][7][6][1]}
5. (obsolete) To turn out, to end up.^[3]

Related words

• venire
• rinvenire
• Latin veniō

Usage notes

The auxiliary is essere, and it is conjugated like venire.^[5][8][3]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. 16, 1040
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
4. ^ a b c d e f g De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b c d 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 c d Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
9. ^ Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
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. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET