scatola

Forms

scatola f (plural scatole)^[1] Old forms include Old Italian iscatola and Old Italian scatolla.^[2] In Rome the word is pronounced with a double /t/, scàttola.^[3]

Etymology

It is probably from Medieval Latin castula (“chest, basket”) with its first consonants reversed (metathesis of ⟨cast-⟩ into ⟨scat-⟩).^[4][5][6][7] DELI gives this explanation with a “perhaps”, and Treccani calls it probable.^[4][8] The Medieval Latin word is a diminutive of a Germanic word *kasto (“chest, casket”), the source of German Kasten (“box, chest”) and of Italian castone (“bezel of a ring”).^[5][1][9] The sources differ on which Germanic language lent it: DELI and Gabrielli say Frankish, DEI Lombardic, Nocentini Old High German or Frankish.^{[4][10][11][5]}

A different explanation, from a Germanic word *skata- (“treasure”), the word of Gothic 𐍃𐌺𐌰𐍄𐍄𐍃 (skatts, “money”), is given by Devoto–Oli, and Körting thought it the only way out if, as Kluge held, German Schachtel came from the Italian word and not the reverse.^[12][13] Diez had derived the Italian word from that German one.^[13]

Earliest recorded meaning

The Latin form scatula is recorded at Venice in 1339, and Boccaccio has the Italian word in the Decameron (1348–1353).^[4][6] The TLIO's earliest record is Francesco Pegolotti's Pratica della mercatura, of the first half of the 14th century, with the sense “container with a lid”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Boccaccio's friars keep their cells full of boxes of sweets, and his Calandrino's tricksters come “with a box of galls and the flask of wine”.^[14] By the 17th century the diminutive scatoletta (Redi) and the augmentative scatolone (1578) were in use.^[5][11]

The word was soon applied to many box-shaped devices: scatola armonica or musicale, a music box, scatola cranica, the bony case of the skull, scatola del cambio, a gearbox, and scatola nera, the flight recorder of an aircraft.^[15][8][1] Food in scatola is canned, which gave scatolame (1931 or 1942) for canned goods.^[8][5][4] Lettere di scatola “very large letters” goes back, Treccani says, to the big labels that apothecaries wrote on their boxes.^[8] In popular speech the plural is a euphemism for the testicles, the source of phrases such as rompere le scatole “to annoy”.^[15][16]

German took the word twice: as Schachtel “box” (1472–1473) and as Schatulle “casket” (1696), and Polish and Serbo-Croatian borrowed it too.^[17][1]

Timeline

• 1339 – Medieval Latin scatula is recorded at Venice.^[4]
• 1348–1353 – Boccaccio uses scatola in the Decameron.^[4][6]
• 1472–1473 – German Schachtel is first recorded.^[17]
• 1578 – Scatolone “large box” is recorded.^[5]
• 17th century – Scatoletta appears in Francesco Redi.^[11][5]
• 1696 – German Schatulle “casket” is recorded.^[17]
• 1910 – Inscatolare “to can, to box” is recorded.^[5]
• 1952 – Scatolificio “box factory” is recorded.^[4][5]

Meanings

Noun

1. box: a container, usually with a lid, made of cardboard, wood, metal or plastic, for keeping or carrying things: Ho messo le vecchie lettere in una scatola di latta.^[6][12][16]
2. The contents of a box: I bambini hanno finito una scatola di biscotti in un pomeriggio.^[6][8]
3. Tin or can of preserved food, as in tonno in scatola “canned tuna”.^[12][8][1]
4. An object or device shaped like a box or enclosing something, as in scatola cranica “cranium” or scatola nera “flight recorder”.^[6][15]
5. (vulgar, in the plural) The testicles, in phrases such as rompere le scatole “to annoy” and averne piene le scatole “to be fed up”.^[16][15]

Word family

• scatoletta
• scatolone
• scatolame
• scatolificio
• scatolaio
• scatolare
• inscatolare
• rompiscatole

Related words

• castone
• German Schachtel
• German Kasten

Usage notes

Comprare a scatola chiusa, literally “to buy in a closed box”, means to buy or accept something without checking it first.^[12][15][8] Scatole cinesi, Chinese boxes that fit inside one another, is also used for a chain of companies each controlling the next.^[12]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
3. ^ Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 885
4. ^ 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
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 De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
7. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier
8. ^ a b c d e f g Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
9. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
10. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
11. ^ a b c Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 3379
12. ^ 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
13. ^ a b Körting, Gustav (1907), Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch: etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Hauptsprachen, 3rd ed., Paderborn: Schöningh
14. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
15. ^ a b c d e Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
16. ^ a b c Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
17. ^ a b c Stammerjohann, Harro, et al. (2008), Dizionario di italianismi in francese, inglese, tedesco, Firenze: Accademia della Crusca; online at difit.italianisticaonline.it