tratta

Forms

tratta f (plural tratte)^[1] Old Italian forms include tracta, trata and tréta.^[2]

Etymology

It is the feminine past participle of trarre (“to draw, pull”) (tratto), used as a noun.^[3][4][2][5] The verb continues inherited from Latin trahō (“to draw, drag”), a verb of obscure origin without sure Indo-European relatives.^[6][4] The sense of the slave trade reproduces French traite, as in the French phrase for the trade in Africans (18th century).^[7][8] The banking sense, a bill of exchange, is short for lettera tratta (“letter drawn on someone”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

GRADIT dates the word to before 1313, in Dante's line on the crowd of the dead: e dietro le venìa sì lunga tratta / di gente “and behind it came so long a line of people”.^[9][3] DELI dates the sense “act of pulling” to Francesco da Buti (before 1406), and DEI cites the 14th-century Tavola ritonda.^[6][8]

Semantic evolution

Old Italian tratta covered a range of senses from “pull”: a jerk of the rope in torture, the distance a missile flies (Boccaccio's una tratta d'arco “a bowshot”), a stretch of space or time, the drawing of lots in elections and the export of goods, or the licence to export them.^[9][10][8] On the Adriatic it named seine fishing and the net itself, which passed into Serbo-Croatian and Modern Greek.^[8][11]

As a bill of exchange the word is recorded as trata in a Florentine document of 1520 and in Sassetti in 1586, and German took it as Tratte.^[6][12][8] The slave trade was tratta di negri by 1765 and tratta degli schiavi in Colletta, and the tratta delle bianche, the trafficking of women into prostitution, gave a book its title in 1908.^[6] The modern sense “section of a railway or bus route” goes back to the old sense “stretch of space”.^[3]

Timeline

• before 1313 – Dante uses tratta for a long line of people.^[9]
• 14th century – The Tavola ritonda uses it for a pull.^[8]
• 1520 – Trata “bill of exchange” appears in a Florentine document.^[6][12]
• 1586 – Filippo Sassetti uses tratta in banking.^[6]
• 1765 – Tratta di negri “slave trade” is recorded.^[6]
• 1908 – Tratta delle bianche appears in a book title.^[6]

Meanings

Noun

1. A section of a railway, bus or air route between two stops: Sulla tratta Bologna–Firenze ci sono ritardi.^[9][3][7]
2. trafficking in people: tratta degli schiavi, the slave trade, tratta delle bianche, trafficking of women for prostitution.^[9][7][13]
3. (banking) A draft, a bill of exchange ordering payment of a sum on a set date.^[9][7][13]
4. (regional, Adriatic) Seine fishing, and the net used for it.^[9][11][1]
5. (archaic) A pull or tug, a stretch of space or time, a line of people, the export of goods.^[9][7][13]

Word family

• trattario

Related words

• trarre
• tratto
• trattare
• strattone
• French traite

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 21, 248
3. ^ 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
4. ^ a b c Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
5. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier, p. 451
6. ^ 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
7. ^ a b c d e Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
8. ^ a b c d e f Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 3872
9. ^ 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
10. ^ Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
11. ^ a b Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
12. ^ a b Stammerjohann, Harro, et al. (2008), Dizionario di italianismi in francese, inglese, tedesco, Firenze: Accademia della Crusca; online at difit.italianisticaonline.it
13. ^ a b c Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana