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scorso

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Pronunciation

Forms

scorso (feminine scorsa, masculine plural scorsi, feminine plural scorse)[1] Old Italian also wrote scorzo.[2]

Etymology

It is the past participle of scorrere (“to run, to flow; to pass”), used as an adjective and a noun.[3][4][5][6][7] According to the LEI and Wiktionary, it is inherited from Latin excursus (“run out; a sally”), the perfect passive participle of excurrō (“to run out”), formed ex- and currō (“to run”).[8][1][9] The same participle continues in French écours, recorded in 1458.[8] The learned excursus, a digression, is the same Latin word, which spread as a term of philology from the Germanic languages.[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELI's first record is the Italian translation of Palladius, around 1340, where scorso means “gone by, passed”.[3] The LEI has an earlier Old Tuscan noun scorso, “execution of a sentence”, in a translation of Valerius Maximus of about 1336.[8]

Semantic evolution

In Old Italian the participle had wider senses: Palladius warns against grapes “too far gone in ripeness” (troppo scorse di maturezza), and in Giovanni Villani the scorso e corrotto volgare is the debased common speech.[10] The time sense, “last”, is the commonest today: Manzoni writes l'anno scorso, non avanzò nulla, “last year nothing was left over”.[2][10]

As a noun scorso meant a rash word (scorso di lingua, in a 14th-century translation of Saint Gregory), and, from 1573–1574 an error made through haste or distraction.[3][8] The LEI records further senses: a current of water (1550), licence or loose morals (Davanzati, before 1606), an outburst of feeling (Bartoli, 1663), a digression (Salvini, before 1729) and a moral fault (Gioberti, 1847).[8] Scorso di penna, a slip of the pen, runs from Vincenzio Borghini to Carducci, and scorso di memoria from 1847.[8] The feminine noun scorsa, a quick look or a quick trip, is recorded from the 17th century.[11]

Timeline

  • About 1336 – The noun scorso appears in a translation of Valerius Maximus.[8]
  • About 1340 – The Palladius translation uses the participle for “passed”.[3]
  • 14th century – Scorso di lingua, a rash word, in a translation of Saint Gregory.[8]
  • 1573–1574 – The noun means a slip, in the Annotazioni to the Decameron.[3]
  • Before 1580 – Vincenzio Borghini has scorso di penna.[8]
  • 1847 – Gioberti has scorso di memoria.[8]

Meanings

Adjective

  1. last, of the period just before the present: Ci siamo visti martedì scorso. L'anno scorso is last year.[12][5][6][1]
  2. (literary) Past, bygone, trascorso.[5][7][13]

Noun

  1. (uncommon) A slip, an error made through haste or inattention: uno scorso di penna.[12][5][7][1]
  2. (archaic) Licence, excess.[5][13]

Word family

  • scorsa
  • scorrere
  • trascorso
  • excursus

References

  1. ^ a b c d e 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
  3. ^ a b c d e Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
  4. ^ Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
  5. ^ 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
  6. ^ a b Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
  7. ^ a b c Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
  8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Pfister, Max; Schweickard, Wolfgang; Prifti, Elton (eds.) (1979–), Lessico Etimologico Italiano, Wiesbaden: Reichert; online at lei-digitale.it, p. 22, 52
  9. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  10. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
  11. ^ Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 3419
  12. ^ a b De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
  13. ^ a b Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli