sfuggire

Forms

sfuggire (first-person singular present sfùggo, first-person singular past historic sfuggìi, past participle sfuggìto, auxiliary (transitive) avére or (intransitive) èssere)^[1] Old forms include sfogire, sfugire and sfuire.^[2]

Etymology

It is from Italian s- + fuggire.^{[3][4][5][6][1]} The sources read the prefix differently: DELI and Nocentini as marking removal, Sabatini–Coletti as intensive, and the GDLI as Latin ex- with either value.^[3][4][7][2] DEI thinks it was perhaps influenced by scappare and compares Latin effugiō (“to flee away, escape”) and Old French s’enfuir of the 12th century.^[8]

The base fuggire continues Latin fugiō (“to flee”), from Proto-Italic *fugjō and Proto-Indo-European *bʰewg-.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

GRADIT dates the verb from before 1320 and Nocentini from 1324–1328.^[5][4] The GDLI quotes the Italian version of Guido delle Colonne, where the people of Calabria are said to love the Greeks more than the Latins, whom they avoid as much as they can (li quali sfugino quanto ponno).^[2] DELI's first record of the transitive sense “to avoid, shun” is in the Italian Crescenzi, about 1350.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The intransitive senses are dated late by DELI: “to slip one's mind” in Paolo Segneri (1673), “to escape from someone or something” in the Milanese press of 1821, and “to slip out by accident”, of things, in Zingarelli's dictionary of 1922.^[3] DEI records the old sfuggevole “fugitive” in the 14th century and the phrase alla sfuggita “in passing” from the same century.^[8]

In modern Italian the transitive verb (with avere) means to avoid people or things, and the intransitive one (with essere) to escape, to slip from the hands, or to escape notice, as in mi sfugge il nome.^[5][7][1]

Timeline

• Before 1320 – GRADIT's first date for the verb.^[5]
• 1324–1328 – Nocentini's first date.^[4]
• c. 1350 – The Italian Crescenzi uses sfuggire “to avoid”.^[3]
• 1673 – Paolo Segneri uses it for “to slip one's mind”.^[3]
• 1821 – The sense “to escape from” is recorded in the Milanese press.^[3]
• 1922 – Zingarelli records the sense “to slip out by accident”.^[3]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive) To avoid a person, keeping away from them: Da quando gli deve dei soldi, lo sfugge.^[5][6][7]
2. (transitive) To dodge something dangerous or unpleasant, to evade a duty: sfuggire le proprie responsabilità.^[5][6][9]
3. (intransitive) To escape from pursuers: Il ladro è sfuggito ai carabinieri.^[5][6][7]
4. (intransitive) To escape a danger: Sono sfuggiti per poco all’incidente.^[5][7][9]
5. (intransitive) To slip from one's hands, or go off by accident: Il bicchiere mi è sfuggito di mano.^[5][7][9]
6. (intransitive) Of words, to slip out without thinking: Mi è sfuggita una parolaccia.^[7][9]
7. (intransitive) To escape someone's notice or memory: Mi sfugge il suo cognome.^[7][5]
8. (intransitive) Of a chance, to be missed: lasciarsi sfuggire un’occasione.^[9]

Word family

• sfuggente
• sfuggevole
• sfuggita

Related words

• fuggire
• fuga
• scappare
• Latin effugiō

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 18, 952
3. ^ 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
4. ^ a b c d Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
6. ^ 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
7. ^ a b c d e f g h Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
8. ^ a b Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 3480
9. ^ a b c d e Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli