salma

Forms

salma f (plural salme)^[1] An old variant is Old Italian sarma.^[2] In Naples sarma was a measure of sixteen tomoli (Loise de Rosa, 1452).^[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *sauma, a spoken form of Late Latin sagma (“packsaddle; load”), which is from Ancient Greek σάγμα (ságma, “packsaddle”).^[4][5][6][1] The form with ⟨au⟩ is recorded in Isidore of Seville, and the form with ⟨gm⟩ in Vegetius.^[3] The Greek noun comes from σάττω (sáttō, “to pack, load”), a verb of unknown origin.^[4][5]

The ⟨al⟩ of the Italian word is a hypercorrection: since Gallo-Romance turned ⟨al⟩ into ⟨au⟩, a form with ⟨au⟩ could be “corrected” back to ⟨al⟩.^[5] DELI refers to Pisani for this change.^[4] The regular outcome of the same word, with ⟨au⟩ becoming ⟨o⟩, is soma “load”.^[5][7][1] The word is Romance-wide except in Romanian: French somme and Occitan saume mean “packsaddle”, and Catalan salma and Spanish salma “ton”.^[5][3] It also passed into Irish and Germanic, as Old High German soum.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The word is first recorded in Pisan accounts of 1279 as a measure of capacity for dry goods and liquids;^[4] Medieval Latin documents of Rome already have it in 1166.^[4] In Guittone d'Arezzo, before 1294, it is a burden of pain carried by the lover, which DELI reads as the human body set against the soul.^[4][2]

Semantic evolution

Nocentini traces the meanings from the load: the body was a salma as the heavy substance beside the soul, then the dead body, and in southern Italy a unit of weight.^[5] The load itself, a pack carried by an animal or the baggage on a wagon, is the sense of Sacchetti and Trissino, and Ariosto and Tasso used it of a ship's cargo.^[2] In love poetry from Guittone to Petrarch it was a burden of anxious thought.^[2] Dante spoke of the Son of God taking on “our salma”, the human body as the soul's burden.^[8][9][10]

The sense “corpse” is recorded before 1612 in Guarini;^[4] Tommaseo in 1872 noted that the written language used la salma for the dead body even in prose.^[4] VEI dates it to Petrarch, but DELI reads the passage in the Trionfo della castità as meaning only “body”.^[4][7] Today it is the respectful word for a dead body, above all in funeral rites.^[6][8][9]

As a measure, salma was used until the metric system, chiefly in Sicily, with a value of about 275 litres, and it also measured land there.^[6][8][9] From the sense “pack, baggage” comes salmeria, the pack animals and stores of an army, recorded before 1292.^[4][5]

Timeline

• 1166 – The word appears in Medieval Latin at Rome as a measure.^[4]
• 1279 – Salma as a measure appears in Pisan records.^[4]
• Before 1292 – Salmeria is recorded in Bono Giamboni.^[4]
• Before 1294 – Guittone d'Arezzo uses salma for a heavy burden of pain.^[4][2]
• Before 1321 – Dante uses the word for the human body.^[5][6]
• Before 1612 – Battista Guarini uses salma for a dead body.^[4]
• 1942 – Salmerista, a soldier in charge of the pack train, is recorded.^[4][5]

Meanings

Noun

1. A dead body, especially as the object of funeral honours; remains: la salma è stata portata in chiesa.^[6][8][9][1]
2. (literary) The human body as opposed to the soul.^[6][8][9]
3. (archaic) A load or burden; heavy armour; figuratively, a weighing worry.^[6][8][10]
4. (historical) An old unit of capacity for dry goods and liquids, used especially in Sicily, where it was about 275 litres; also a Sicilian measure of land.^{[6][8][9][11]}

Word family

• salmeria
• salmerista

Related words

• soma
• Late Latin sagma
• Ancient Greek σάγμα (ságma)

Usage notes

GDLI records a separate Old Florentine salma “seasoning”, which it takes as a feminine of saime “lard”.^[12]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 17, 415
3. ^ a b c d Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 3319
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b c d e f g h De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
7. ^ a b Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 867
8. ^ 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
9. ^ a b c d e f Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
10. ^ a b Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
11. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
12. ^ Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca