Etymologically
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sangue

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Pronunciation

  • /ˈsan.ɡwe/[1]

Forms

sangue m (plural sangui)[1] Old and dialect forms include Old Italian sange, Old Italian sango and Old Italian sànguinu, and the word was sometimes feminine in Old Italian (la sange, la sàngua), with a plural le sangui.[2] It was feminine in Old Venetian, Old Sienese and Old Apulian, as in Spanish.[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin sanguis (“blood”), through the accusative ⟨sanguem⟩, which replaced classical ⟨sanguinem⟩ (Wiktionary calls it Late Latin), or through the old neuter sanguen.[4][5][1][6][7] The word is panromance: French sang, Occitan sanc, Catalan sang, Spanish sangre, Portuguese sangue, Sardinian sàmbene and Romanian sânge.[7][8]

The origin of the Latin word is uncertain.[4][7] Its first part may go back to Proto-Indo-European *h₁sh₂-én-, the oblique stem of the PIE word for “blood”, *h₁ésh₂r̥, which is Hittite ēšḫar, Sanskrit असृज् (ásṛj) and Ancient Greek ἔαρ (éar); the second part is less clear.[9][1] It is disputed whether sanguen or sanguis is the older form, and Wiktionary favours the view that the neuter was remade after unguen (“grease”).[9][1][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI's first record is in Bono Giamboni's Vizi e virtudi, before 1292, for the blood in the body, and Giamboni also writes that “lo sangue è caldo e umido ed ha il suo sedio nel fegato” (blood is hot and moist and has its seat in the liver).[4][2]

Semantic evolution

The sense “family, lineage” is in Brunetto Latini before 1294, and Giovanni Villani uses the word for all that one owns, money and work, before 1348.[4] The language of humours, violence and kinship produced many phrases, from a sangue freddo to bagno di sangue and all'ultimo sangue.[5][11] Sangue blu “blue blood” has equivalents in French, English and German and probably goes back to Spanish sangre azul, said of the old families of Castile, whose blue veins showed through fair skin;[4] principe del sangue copies French prince du sang (1573).[4]

As an invariable adjective after a noun, sangue means “blood-red”, as in rosso sangue (1872).[4][1] Sangue di drago, the red resin of a palm, is recorded in Old Sienese in 1310.[3]

Timeline

  • Before 1292 – Bono Giamboni uses the word for blood.[4]
  • Before 1294 – Brunetto Latini uses it for lineage.[4]
  • 1310 – Sangue di drago is recorded in Old Sienese.[3]
  • Before 1348 – Giovanni Villani uses it for one's possessions.[4]
  • 1872 – The adjectival use “blood-red” is recorded.[4]
  • 1942 – Sanguemisto “person of mixed race” is recorded.[4]

Meanings

Noun

  1. blood, the red fluid that circulates in the body of vertebrates.[5][12][6]
  2. Blood shed from the body: Aveva le mani sporche di sangue.[5][13]
  3. (figurative) Bloodshed, killing; the lives lost in a war or struggle: anni di sangue.[5][6]
  4. (figurative) Lineage, descent; kinship: vincolo di sangue.[5][6][1]
  5. (figurative) Temperament, character: avere il sangue caldo.[6][1]

Adjective

  1. (invariable) Blood-red, in rosso sangue.[4][1][12]

Word family

  • sanguemisto
  • sanguetta
  • sanguinaccio
  • sanguinella
  • sanguigna
  • dissanguare
  • rinsanguare
  • purosangue
  • insanguinare
  • sanguifero
  • sanguificare
  • sanguigno
  • sanguinare
  • sanguinario
  • sanguineo
  • sanguinoso
  • sanguisuga
  • sanguinolento
  • consanguineo
  • esangue
  • Latin sanguis

Usage notes

Al sangue is said of meat cooked rare: una bistecca al sangue.[12][14] The plural sangui is literary or rare.[11][12]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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. 17, 497
  3. ^ a b c Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 3331
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m 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 De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
  6. ^ a b c d e Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
  7. ^ a b c Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
  8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
  9. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
  10. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  11. ^ a b Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
  12. ^ a b c d Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
  13. ^ Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
  14. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli