tegola

Forms

tegola f (plural tegole)^[1] Old forms include Old Italian tegula, Old Italian teghola, Old Italian tevola and Old Italian tigola.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin tēgula (“roof tile”), formed from tegō (“to cover”) with the diminutive suffix -ula.^[3][4][5][1] The word keeps the vowel ⟨u⟩ that the inherited doublet teglia, a shallow baking pan, lost;^[3][4][6][7] Nocentini calls it a semi-learned outcome, which entered popular use later, and Zingarelli and the GDLI call it learned.^[3][4][6][7] Wiktionary leaves open whether it is a semi-learned borrowing or a regular development of a variant with the vowel.^[1] The pan got its name, Nocentini says, from the simple practice of cooking food on a tile laid over the fire.^[4]

The same Latin word gave French tuile, Occitan teula, Catalan teula, Spanish teja, Portuguese telha and Logudorese teula.^[4][8] It passed from imperial Latin into Germanic: Old High German ziagal, whence German Ziegel and Romanian țiglă, and Old English tigele, whence the English word tile.^[4][8]

Latin tegō goes back to Proto-Indo-European *(s)teg- (“to cover”).^[9][1] The long ⟨ē⟩ of tēgula is hard to explain; some scholars take it from an early simplification of a cluster in *teg-dʰlom, comparing rēgula.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is a Sienese document of 1221, the inventory of the goods of Orlando d'Ugolino.^[3][2] The sense is the roof tile.^[3][2]

Semantic evolution

Old Italian used the word for a roof tile and, by extension, a roof; it could also mean a brick.^[2][10] A 13th-century life of Saint Francis tells how he climbed on the roof, “smashing slabs and tiles” (laste e tegole guastando).^[7] Statutes of the Siena customs taxed “each kiln-load of tiles or gutter tiles” (ciascuna fornaciata di tegole o docci).^[7][11] The masculine tegolo, the Tuscan form, is recorded before 1320 and in Crescenzi's translation of about 1350.^[4][3][12]

Modern Italian distinguishes curved and flat tiles, the coppo and the embrice, the tegola marsigliese and the portoghese.^[13][6][14] The figurative sense, an unexpected blow of fortune, comes from a tile falling on someone's head: cadere una tegola in testa.^[15][13] In cookery a tegola is also a thin, crisp biscuit, often with almonds.^[16]

Timeline

• 1221 – A Sienese inventory has the first record.^[3][2]
• Before 1320 – The masculine tegolo is recorded.^[4]
• About 1350 – Crescenzi's translation uses tegolo.^[3]
• 1575 – The diminutive tegolino is recorded.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. A roof tile: any of the shaped pieces, usually of fired clay, that cover a roof.^[13][16][12]
2. (figurative) A sudden and unexpected misfortune or blow.^[13][16][15]
3. (cooking) A thin, crisp biscuit made with sugar or honey and butter, sometimes with almonds.^[16]

Word family

• tegolo
• tegolino
• tegolata
• tegolato
• tegolone
• tegolaia

Related words

• teglia
• tetto
• Latin tegula
• French tuile
• English tile

Usage notes

A regional tegola of northern Italy, a bean pod and a pastry shaped like one, recorded in Messisburgo's 16th-century cookery, is a different word, a diminutive of tega.^[7] Tuscan also uses the masculine tegolo.^[12]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e 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 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 f g h i Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
5. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
7. ^ a b c d e Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 20, 799
8. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
9. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
10. ^ Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 3739
11. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
12. ^ a b c Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
13. ^ a b c d De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
14. ^ Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
15. ^ a b Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
16. ^ 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