trebbiare

Forms

trebbiare (first-person singular present trébbio, first-person singular past historic trebbiài, past participle trebbiàto, auxiliary avére)^[1] Popular Tuscan tribbiare.^[2][3][4][1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *trebŭlāre (“to tread, thresh”), a dialect variant of Latin trībulō (“to press, squeeze”), which is formed from trībulum (“threshing sledge”).^{[5][6][3][7][8][9]} GRADIT gives the base as *trĭbŭlāre and Wiktionary as *triblāre.^[10][1] The classical form survives in Tuscan tribbiare, and the learned tribolare is the same Latin verb.^[5][1][3] DELI rejects the link with tripudio that Vincenzio Borghini proposed.^[5]

The threshing sledge was a toothed board dragged over the ears of grain spread on the threshing floor, a technique used in southern Italy until the 20th century.^[6][9] Meyer-Lübke notes that the Romance words name this kind of threshing, with the board or with animals treading the grain, and only in Tuscany also threshing with the flail.^[11] The same verb gave Spanish trillar, Portuguese trilhar, Romanian triera and Old Campidanese trebulare.^[6][11][12]

The Latin noun is formed from terō (“to rub; to thresh”), whose perfect is ⟨trīvī⟩.^[5][6][9] De Vaan traces the verb to Proto-Indo-European *terh₁- (“to rub”).^[13]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in the Fatti di Cesare, a Sienese text of the late 13th century, in the sense “to separate the grains from the straw and chaff”.^[14] Dante's Convivio (1304–1308) uses the infinitive as a noun: nel trebbiare lo frumento (“in threshing the wheat”).^[5][15]

Semantic evolution

Old Italian also used the verb figuratively for “to torment” and “to tear to pieces”, a sense Fra Giordano has in the early 14th century.^[14][16] In the 16th century Davanzati used it for “to grind, chop”.^[16]

Tommaseo describes threshing on the threshing floor with the trebbia or the flail, or by having animals tread the sheaves, and notes that in the Florentine countryside people said battere, while in the Maremma, where horses trod the grain, they said tribbiare.^[17] Machines brought new words: trebbiatrice “threshing machine” is recorded in 1873, in a pamphlet on the Weil thresher, and trebbia took the same sense by the end of the century.^[5][6] Trebbia had also named an instrument of torture in the 14th century.^[5][6]

Timeline

• Late 13th century – The verb appears in the Sienese Fatti di Cesare.^[14]
• 1304–1308 – Dante uses trebbiare as a noun in the Convivio.^[5][15]
• Before 1311 – Fra Giordano uses trebbia and trebbiatura figuratively.^[5]
• 1348–1353 – Boccaccio uses the verb.^[5]
• Before 1580 – Vincenzio Borghini uses trebbiatura for threshing.^[5]
• 1873 – Trebbiatrice “threshing machine” is recorded.^[5][6]
• 1879 – Trebbiatore is recorded.^[5][6]
• 1895 – Trebbia is used for the threshing machine.^[6]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive, agriculture) To thresh: to separate the grains of wheat or another cereal from the ears, straw and chaff, now by machine, once with flails or by having animals tread it; also used without an object: A luglio trebbiavano l'orzo sull'aia.^{[10][2][4][18][8]}
2. (transitive, obsolete) To grind, crush.^[10][7]

Word family

• trebbia
• trebbiatrice
• trebbiatura
• trebbiatore
• strebbiare

Related words

• tribbiare
• tribolare
• Latin tribulum

Usage notes

In Pistoia trebbiare meant “to beat”, and in the mountains near Pistoia trebbià or tribbià meant to break into pieces by trampling.^[16]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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
3. ^ a b c Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
4. ^ a b Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
7. ^ a b Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
8. ^ a b Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
9. ^ a b c Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ a b c De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
11. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
12. ^ Körting, Gustav (1907), Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch: etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Hauptsprachen, 3rd ed., Paderborn: Schöningh
13. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
14. ^ a b c Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
15. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
16. ^ a b c Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 3878
17. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
18. ^ Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana