ruttare

Forms

ruttare (first-person singular present rùtto, first-person singular past historic ruttài, past participle ruttàto, auxiliary avére)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin rūctō (“to belch”), a frequentative of an unrecorded *rūgō that is inferred from the compound ērūgō.^[2][3][1] The noun rutto continues the Latin verbal noun rūctus.^[2]

The same word is French roter, Occitan rotar, Catalan rotar and Portuguese arrotar, and Logudorese ruttare;^[3][4] By contrast, Spanish eructar is a learned form.^[3][4] The French and Occitan vowel seems to require a Late Latin *ruptāre, and the 6th-century physician Oribasius wrote ruptus in place of the noun.^[5][4] Northern Italian dialects altered the word, as in Comasco rügi and Piedmontese rudé.^[5][4]

The unrecorded verb comes from the root also seen in rugiō (“to roar”), the source of ruggire.^[3][6] Its cognates include Ancient Greek ἐρεύγομαι (ereúgomai, “to belch”) and Old English rocettan (“to belch”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁rewg- (“belch, roar”).^[1][3] Nocentini sees the same imitative base in rūmor (“noise”).^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Nocentini, DEI and GRADIT date the verb to the 13th century.^[3][5][7] DELI's first records, in the 14th-century translations of Seneca and the Esposizione di Salmi, have the sense “to belch”: Seneca's gluttons “have foul breath and belch disgustingly”.^[2][8]

Semantic evolution

Already in the 14th century the verb was used transitively in the sense “to belch out, throw up”: the translation of Guido delle Colonne speaks of oxen “belching fiery flames”.^[2][9] Later writers applied it to volcanoes and whirlpools, as Annibal Caro's sea and mountain “belching flames, smoke, sparks, sand and foam”.^[10][9]

The figurative sense “to spew out vulgarities or insults” is first recorded in Benedetto Menzini in 1718.^[2] Treccani notes that both the noun and the verb are often avoided as vulgar.^[10] Old forms include rottare, and the noun rotto survives in Umbrian and Roman speech.^[8][5]

Timeline

• 13th century – First date given by Nocentini, DEI and GRADIT.^[3][5][7]
• 14th century – The translations of Seneca and of Guido delle Colonne use the verb.^[2]
• About 1350 – The noun rutto is recorded in the translation of Crescenzi, after Genoese ruto in the 13th century.^[2]
• 1566 – Rutteggiare is recorded in Fausto da Longiano.^[5]
• 1718 – Benedetto Menzini uses the verb for uttering insults.^[2]

Meanings

Verb

1. (intransitive, auxiliary avere) To burp, belch: to let out one or more rutti.^[7][11][1]
2. (transitive) To bring up with a belch part of what one has eaten or drunk: ruttare l'aglio.^[7][11]
3. (transitive, figurative, derogatory) To utter coarsely: ruttare parolacce.^[7][11][12]
4. (literary) To erupt, throw out: of a volcano, to emit lava or flames; of something else, to make a dull rumbling noise.^[7][10][13]

Word family

• rutto
• rutteggiare
• ruttatore

Related words

• eruttare
• ruggire
• Latin rūctō
• French roter

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h 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 d e f g h Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
4. ^ a b c d Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
5. ^ a b c d e f Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 3300
6. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier
7. ^ a b c d e f De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
8. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 17, 280
9. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
10. ^ a b c Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
11. ^ a b c Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
12. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
13. ^ Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli