undici

Forms

undici (invariable)^[2] Old Italian forms include undeci, undece, undese and ondesi.^[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin ūndecim (“eleven”), a compound of ūnus (“one”) and decem (“ten”).^[4][5][2][1] The same Latin word gave French onze, Occitan onze, Catalan onze, Spanish once and Portuguese onze, and Dalmatian jonko in Vegliote;^[5][6][7] Romanian has instead a new phrase, un spre zeci.^[5][6][7]

The Latin word goes back to an earlier *oinodecem, from Proto-Indo-European *óynom and *déḱm̥t.^[1] The ⟨i⟩ of the second part, against the ⟨e⟩ of the word for “ten”, is not well explained: de Vaan thinks it was taken from the ordinals such as undecimus.^[8]

The Italian final ⟨-i⟩ is itself a problem, discussed by Castellani.^[4] The form undeci, closer to Latin, was also used (Ariosto, 1532), and Gherardini remarked that the form with ⟨-i⟩ was the more common one, “though without reason”.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in an account book of Florentine bankers of 1211, as the number made of ten units and one.^[4][3][2]

Semantic evolution

Old Italian used the numeral in compounds (dugentoundici) and for a score at dice.^[3] As a noun it names the number and its sign (14th century, the Ottimo commento).^[4]

In the 20th century undici became a name for a football team, from its eleven players (1942), and l'undici azzurro the Italian national side (1965).^[4] In betting it is a winning score of the second category.^[2]

Timeline

• 1211 – An account book of Florentine bankers has undici.^[4][3]
• 1304–1308 – Dante uses the ordinal undecimo.^[4]
• 1300s – The noun undici names the number and its sign.^[4]
• 1532 – Ariosto writes undeci.^[4]
• Before 1698 – Francesco Redi uses undicesimo.^[4]
• 1879 – Undicenne “eleven-year-old” is recorded.^[4]
• 1942 – Undici is recorded for a football team.^[4]

Meanings

Numeral

1. eleven, ten plus one; written 11 or XI: ha undici anni.^[2][1]
2. After a noun, with ordinal value, eleventh: il capitolo undici.^[2]

Noun

1. The number eleven and the sign for it.^[2][4]
2. The eleventh day of a month, or the eleventh year of a century: l'undici marzo.^[2]
3. Eleven o'clock, or 23:00.^[2]
4. (football) A team of eleven players: l'undici azzurro.^[2][4]

Word family

• undicesimo
• undecimo
• undicenne

Related words

• uno
• dieci
• Latin undecim

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
3. ^ a b c d Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
5. ^ a b c Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
7. ^ a b Körting, Gustav (1907), Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch: etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Hauptsprachen, 3rd ed., Paderborn: Schöningh
8. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill