scarmigliare

Forms

scarmigliare (first-person singular present scarmìglio, first-person singular past historic scarmigliài, past participle scarmigliàto, auxiliary avére)^[1] Variants are schermigliare and sgarmigliare.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *excarminiāre (“to dishevel”), a variant of *excarmināre (“to card”), formed with ex- on Latin carminō (“to card, comb wool”).^{[3][4][5][6][7]} The ending was reshaped after scapigliare and scompigliare.^[3][8][4][9] DELI and Zingarelli start from the simpler Vulgar Latin verb, with the ending of the first of these Italian verbs laid over it, and GRADIT and the GDLI see a cross of the old verb scarminare (“to tangle”) with the same two Italian verbs.^{[8][10][11][2]} Medieval Latin documents of Emilia have Medieval Latin scarmigliare (“to seize by the hair”) at Bologna in 1255 and scarminare at Modena in 1327.^[8][12]

The form in ⟨-iāre⟩ also gave Venetian sgramignar, and the simpler form gave Romanian scărmăna (“to card”) and Spanish escarmenar (“to disentangle”).^[12][7]

The Latin verb comes from carmen (“carding comb”), which is derived from carō (“to card”), a verb of Indo-European origin.^[8][3] Nocentini compares it with Lithuanian and Sanskrit verbs meaning “to dig” and “to scrape”.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI's first Italian record is the reflexive scarmigliarsi “to come to blows” in Luigi Pulci's Morgante (1483): Rinaldo si scarmiglia col leone (“Rinaldo grapples with the lion”).^[8][13][5] Zingarelli dates the verb 1481, and DEI to the 14th century.^[10][12]

Semantic evolution

The original sense, “to card wool”, survives in the carnival songs, where among the trades “chi purga o tigne, chi lava, o scarmiglia” (“some clean or dye, some wash or card”); GRADIT dates this sense before 1564.^[13][11] The Pataffio already uses the reflexive for a brawl: E poi ci scarmigliammo insieme alquanto (“and then we tussled together a while”).^[13]

The sense “to dishevel the hair”, now the main one, is dated by DELI before 1694, in Paolo Segneri, who describes grieving mothers tearing at their hair.^[8][2] Carlo Gozzi has the variant sgarmigliato il tuppè (“the topknot ruffled”), and Carducci describes women pallide, scarmigliate crying from doors and balconies.^[2][14] In his letters Caro used the verb figuratively of a text he feared he had treated too roughly.^[13]

Timeline

• 1255 – Medieval Latin scarmigliare “to seize by the hair” is recorded at Bologna.^[8]
• 1327 – Scarminare is recorded at Modena.^[12]
• 1483 – Luigi Pulci uses scarmigliarsi “to come to blows”.^[8]
• Before 1564 – First record of the sense “to card”.^[11]
• Before 1694 – Paolo Segneri uses the verb of dishevelled hair.^[8]
• 19th century – Scarmigliatura is recorded.^[12]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive) To dishevel, to tousle (the hair).^{[11][6][15][10][1]}: La corsa le aveva scarmigliato i capelli.^[11][6]
2. (reflexive) To get one's hair dishevelled.^{[6][15][10][5]}
3. (reflexive, archaic) To come to blows, to grapple.^[6][10][5]
4. (transitive, archaic) To card (wool or flax).^{[11][10][16][1]}

Word family

• scarmigliato
• scarmigliatura
• scarmiglione

Related words

• carminare
• scapigliare
• scompigliare
• Latin carmen
• Romanian scărmăna

References

1. ^ a b c 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. 17, 858
3. ^ a b c d Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
4. ^ a b Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975)
5. ^ a b c d Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
6. ^ a b c d e Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
7. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
8. ^ a b c d e f g h i Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
9. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier
10. ^ a b c d e f Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
11. ^ a b c d e f De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
12. ^ a b c d e Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 3376
13. ^ a b c d Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
14. ^ Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
15. ^ a b Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
16. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli