spoglio

Forms

Noun: spoglio m (plural spogli)^[1] Adjective: spoglio (feminine spoglia, masculine plural spogli, feminine plural spoglie)^[1]

Etymology

Both the noun and the adjective are from Italian spogliare (“to strip, undress”).^[2][3][4][1] The noun is a deverbal noun with no suffix.^[2][5] The adjective is a short form of the past participle spogliato.^[2][6][5]

The verb continues Latin spoliō (“to strip of clothing or arms, rob”), from spolium (“skin, hide; arms stripped from an enemy”).^[2][3][7] Most other Romance languages continue the compound dēspoliō instead, mostly in the figurative sense: French dépouiller, Occitan despolhar, Catalan despullar, Spanish despojar, Portuguese despojar and Romanian despuia.^[3] The simple verb survives on the edges of the Italo-Romance area, in Sardinian ispozare, Friulian spoià and Romansh spoglier.^[3]

De Vaan traces the Latin noun to Proto-Italic *spolio- (“skin, hide”) and further to Proto-Indo-European *spol(H)-i(o)- (“what is split, stripped off”), probably from a root *(s)pelH- (“to split, cleave”), whose exact form is hard to establish.^[7] He compares Ancient Greek σπολάς (spolás, “leather garment”) and German spalten (“to split”).^[7][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The noun is first recorded in G. Villani's chronicle (before 1348) for plunder: innumerabile spoglio di moneta (“countless plundering of money”).^[2][8]

Semantic evolution

From plunder and spoliation the noun moved to the sense of going through a mass of material to sort and classify it (before 1574, Vasari).^[2] Fare lo spoglio of a text, reading it to collect its words or features, is recorded before 1676 in C. R. Dati.^[2] The count of the votes after an election appears as spoglio dei voti in Tommaseo–Bellini (1873) and as spoglio delle schede in a newspaper of 1956.^[2] Law kept the old sense in spoglio del possesso and azione di spoglio, canon law in the diritto di spoglio over a dead beneficiary's surplus income, and architecture in materiale di spoglio.^[5]

The adjective is recorded from 1702, in the writer Mocenigo.^[2] Tommaseo–Bellini and Manuzzi quote it from Giacomo da Lentini, but DELI takes that example to be apocryphal.^[2] Zingarelli dates the adjective 1292 and DEI to the 13th century.^[9][10] Its sense “free from, untouched by”, as in non è spoglio di passioni, is recorded in 1873.^[2][11]

Timeline

• Before 1348 – G. Villani uses the noun for plunder.^[2]
• Before 1574 – Vasari uses it for the sorting and classifying of material.^[2]
• Before 1676 – C. R. Dati uses fare lo spoglio of a text.^[2]
• 1702 – A. G. Mocenigo uses the adjective “bare, stripped”.^[2]
• 1873 – Tommaseo–Bellini records spoglio dei voti and the adjective “free from”.^[2]
• 1956 – Spoglio delle schede appears in Il Gazzettino.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. The count of the votes after an election: the opening and examination of the ballot papers, a scrutinio: Lo spoglio è andato avanti fino all'alba.^{[4][6][12][1]}
2. The systematic collection, examination and selection of data; in philology and lexicography, the reading of a text or author to pick out the words or features needed for a study, and the slips that record them.^{[4][12][6][5]}
3. (law) dispossession: the taking of a property from its possessor by force or deceit, as in azione di spoglio, the action for reinstatement.^{[4][12][5][13]}
4. (canon law) The surplus of a benefice's income left when the beneficiary dies, which falls to the Church.^[4][5]
5. (architecture) In materiale di spoglio: building material taken from demolished buildings and reused, spolia.^[12][5]

Adjective

1. bare, stripped: of trees, without leaves, flowers or fruit; of land, without vegetation, barren.^{[4][12][5][1]}
2. (figurative) Unadorned, plain: of a room, without furnishings; of a style, sparse and essential.^[4][12]
3. (uncommon) Free from, devoid of (with di): un giudice spoglio di simpatie.^[4][6][5]

Word family

• semispoglio

Related words

• spoglia
• spoliazione
• spogliatoio

Usage notes

A rarer noun spoglio, meaning cast-off clothes (before 1356, Lancia) and the skin of an animal (14th century, Trattato del governo degli uccelli), has a separate source: it continues Latin spolium directly.^[2][9] In literary use it also named a lion's skin (Poliziano) and a dead body (D'Annunzio).^[14]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
3. ^ a b c d Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
4. ^ a b c d e f g h De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
6. ^ a b c d Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
7. ^ a b c de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
8. ^ Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
9. ^ a b Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
10. ^ Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 3598
11. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
12. ^ a b c d e f Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
13. ^ Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
14. ^ Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 19, 985