Etymologically
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stronzo

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Pronunciation

  • /ˈstron.t͡so/[1]

Forms

stronzo m (plural stronzi, feminine stronza, diminutive stronzétto or stronzettìno, augmentative stronzóne, pejorative stronzàccio)[1] An older spelling is Old Italian stronço.[2]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Lombardic *strunz (“dung”).[3][4][5][6][1] Nocentini compares Low German strunt and Dutch stront, and derives French étron from the corresponding Frankish *strunt;[4] Wiktionary traces the Lombardic word to Proto-West Germanic *strunt.[1] The same word is Sicilian strunzu.[1]

Zaccaria connected it with Middle High German strunze (“stump, stub”), and thought the original idea was “a piece cut off”;[7] Körting likewise compares Old High German strunzan (“to cut off”).[8] Meyer-Lübke, as Körting reports, preferred to start from Late Latin strundius, a word for dung in the Latin glossaries, and Prati also derived it from that form;[8][9] Zaccaria held that the Latin word was modelled on French and appears too late and too locally to be the source.[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Medieval Latin stroncus is recorded at Torcello near Venice in 1290 or 1291.[3] The TLIO's first Italian record is a Prato document of 1299, followed by Franco Sacchetti's Trecentonovelle (before 1400), where two men bite into what they think is food and spit it out: “Oimè e' sono stronzi di cane” (Alas, they are dog turds).[2][3][10]

Semantic evolution

For centuries the word meant only a lump of excrement and appeared in comic and burlesque verse, from Cammelli and Folengo to Marino and Frugoni.[10] The insult for a worthless or despicable person spread from Rome: Migliorini recorded the Roman A strónzo! in 1950.[3] Paolo Zolli argued that Roman dialect had taken it from southern Italy, perhaps from Sicily, where Mortillaro's dictionary (1881) already gives strunzu as an abusive name for a worthless man.[3][10]

From the insult Italian formed stronzaggine (1967) and stronzata “nonsense, stupid act” (1978).[4] The word reached American English slang in the 1970s as strunz “rubbish”.[11]

Timeline

  • 1290–1291 – Medieval Latin stroncus is recorded at Torcello.[3]
  • 1299 – The word appears in a Prato document.[2]
  • Before 1400 – Franco Sacchetti uses stronzi.[3][5]
  • 1881 – Sicilian strunzu “worthless man” is recorded by Mortillaro.[3]
  • 1950 – Migliorini records the Roman insult A strónzo!.[3]
  • 1967 – Stronzaggine is recorded.[4]
  • 1970s – American English slang strunz is recorded.[11]
  • 1978 – Stronzata is recorded.[4]

Meanings

Noun

  1. (vulgar) A turd, a solid piece of excrement.[5][12][13]
  2. (vulgar, figurative) A stupid or despicable person, a bastard, often as an insult; also jokingly: Smettila di fare lo stronzo![5][12][14][15]

Adjective

  1. (vulgar) Nasty, despicable, or stupid: un capo stronzo, una risposta stronza.[5][12][13]

Word family

  • stronzolo
  • Dutch stront
  • French étron

Usage notes

A different, obsolete adjective stronzo meant “clipped”, of coins, and is formed from the verb stronzare “to cut short”;[16][17] Buonarroti the Younger lists coins that were tose, stronze (shorn, clipped).[16][17]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
  3. ^ 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
  4. ^ a b c d e Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
  5. ^ a b c d e De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
  6. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier
  7. ^ a b Zaccaria, Enrico (1901), L'elemento germanico nella lingua italiana: lessico con appendice e prospetto cronologico, Bologna: Treves
  8. ^ a b Körting, Gustav (1907), Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch: etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Hauptsprachen, 3rd ed., Paderborn: Schöningh
  9. ^ Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 958
  10. ^ 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. 20, 391
  11. ^ a b Stammerjohann, Harro, et al. (2008), Dizionario di italianismi in francese, inglese, tedesco, Firenze: Accademia della Crusca; online at difit.italianisticaonline.it
  12. ^ a b c 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 Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
  14. ^ Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
  15. ^ Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
  16. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 20, 392
  17. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET