sugna

Forms

sugna f (plural sugne)^[1] Old forms include Old Italian songia, Old Italian sogna and the northern Old Italian sonza.^[2][3] Regional forms keep the first syllable: asciugna at Lucca and assogna in Umbria and Rome, while Naples has Neapolitan nzogna.^[4][5]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin axungia (“axle grease”), a compound of axis (“axle”) and ungō (“to smear, anoint”), so properly the fat used to grease the axles of carts.^{[6][7][8][1][9]} In Latin it already meant animal fat in general, usually pig's fat, also used in medicine.^[8][7]

The word survives in the western Romance languages.^[4] The same word is Friulian assùngia, Sardinian assundza and Romansh songa, and in the east Romanian osînză.^[10][11] French axonge and Spanish enjundia came through learned transmission, according to Nocentini.^[7] The LEI explains the Iberian forms with an inserted ⟨n⟩, as in the spelling Medieval Latin anxungia of Medieval Latin recorded before 1045.^[10]

The loss of the first syllable has two explanations.^[4][10] DEI notes that already in Latin the syllable was felt as a prefix, as variants such as absungia and erungia show.^[4] The LEI suggests a false division of the article, ⟨l'assúña⟩ read as ⟨la súña⟩.^[10] The group ⟨ngi⟩ gave the palatal nasal /ɲ/, written ⟨gn⟩, in central and southern Italy, and /ndʒ/ in the north, hence forms like songia and sonza.^[10][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The Old Italian word named the fat of the pig and other animals, used in remedies and to grease leather.^[2][12] A Tuscan translation of Crescenzi's treatise on farming advises pounding leaves with old pig's sugna for cold swellings.^[2][6]

Semantic evolution

DELI defines the word as the mass of fat around the pig's kidneys, melted down to make lard (strutto).^[6] Old Italian already used it for the fat of hens and geese in ointments.^[12] In the 15th century the boys of Venice called the Germans magnasonza, “lard-eaters”.^[5] In Rome and Naples the local forms came to mean lard itself, a sense common in the south.^[5]

Modern dictionaries keep the kidney fat and the lard made from it, and by extension greasy, stubborn dirt.^[13][14] The old sense of grease for cart wheels is now rare.^[15][16] A Teramo saying about taking the sugna out of the cat's mouth means trying to take from someone a thing they hold very dear.^[17]

Timeline

• Before 1292 – Zingarelli dates the first record.^[15]
• Before 1320 – GRADIT and Nocentini date the word.^[13][7]
• 1339 – The derivative sungniaccio appears in the account book of the Del Bene.^[6]
• 1344 – Sugnaccio is recorded in the Libro della Mensa.^[6]
• c. 1350 – The Tuscan translation of Crescenzi uses sugna.^[6]
• c. 1364 – Boccaccio uses sugna.^[17]
• 1458 – Venetian boys call the Germans magnasonza.^[5]
• 1555 – The adjective sugnoso is recorded.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. The fat around the kidneys of the pig, from which lard and fats for soaps and ointments are made.^[13][9][15]
2. The lard itself.^[13][14][16]
3. (by extension) Greasy, persistent grime.^[13]
4. (rare) grease for the wheels of carts and carriages.^{[13][15][16][1]}

Word family

• sugnaccio
• sugnoso
• insugnare

Related words

• lardo
• strutto
• ungere
• Latin axungia

Usage notes

The pejoratives are sugnaccia and the rarer sugnaccio, a piece of sugna.^[3][15] GRADIT records sugna benzoinata, lard treated with benzoin.^[13]

References

1. ^ a b c d 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. 20, 512
3. ^ a b Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
4. ^ a b c d e f Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 3674
5. ^ a b c d Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 962
6. ^ a b c d e f Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
7. ^ a b c d Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
8. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
10. ^ a b c d e Pfister, Max; Schweickard, Wolfgang; Prifti, Elton (eds.) (1979–), Lessico Etimologico Italiano, Wiesbaden: Reichert; online at lei-digitale.it, p. 3, 2745
11. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
12. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
13. ^ a b c d e f g De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
14. ^ a b Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
15. ^ a b c d e Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
16. ^ a b c Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
17. ^ a b Pfister, Max; Schweickard, Wolfgang; Prifti, Elton (eds.) (1979–), Lessico Etimologico Italiano, Wiesbaden: Reichert; online at lei-digitale.it