vergogna

Forms

vergogna f (plural vergogne)^[1] Old Italian has many forms, such as vergogna, vergonça and verghogna.^[2] The south has Sicilian and Calabrian vrigogna.^[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *verecunnia, the popular outcome of Latin verēcundia (“restraint, modesty; shame”).^[4][5][6][1] The learned verecondia is its doublet.^[4][1] The same word is French vergogne, now only in a phrase meaning “shamelessly”, Occitan vergonha, Catalan vergonya, Spanish vergüenza and Portuguese vergonha.^[5][3] DEI regards the Italian word as belonging to northern Italy and the western Romance area, and it reached the southern dialects too.^[3]

Devoto explains the form by the loss of the unstressed inner vowel, the northern voicing of ⟨-c-⟩ to ⟨-g-⟩ (as in gragnola) and the change of ⟨-ndj-⟩ to ⟨-nj-⟩, written ⟨gn⟩.^[7] Wiktionary suggests the influence of cunnus.^[1] The Latin noun is derived from verēcundus (“restrained, modest”), from vereor (“to show respect, fear”), which de Vaan traces to Proto-Indo-European *wer- (“to note, be wary”), the root also of Gothic 𐍅𐌰𐍂𐍃 (wars, “careful”) and English wary.^[8][9][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first record is the Venetian Proverbia que dicuntur, of the late 12th century.^[2] In DELI the first record is Brunetto Latini, before 1294, who defines it as a passion of the soul and not a virtue: Vergogna è passione d'animo, e non è virtude.^[4][10]

Semantic evolution

Old Italian already used the word for the feeling of shame, for blushing, for shyness and for dishonour, and also for an insult or outrage and for the private parts.^[2] Dante, in the Convivio, called it “fear of dishonour”, good and praiseworthy in women and the young, an echo of Aristotle through Thomas Aquinas.^[4] Petrarch uses it for a person or thing that brings disgrace (1374).^[4]

The derivatives vergognarsi and vergognoso are as old as Guittone and Dante, and svergognare and svergognato appear in the 14th century.^[4][5] Today the exclamation vergogna! expresses strong disapproval.^[6][11]

Timeline

• Late 12th century – Vergogna appears in the Venetian Proverbia que dicuntur.^[2]
• Before 1294 – Brunetto Latini defines shame as a passion of the soul.^[4]
• 1293–1294 – Dante uses vergognoso.^[4]
• 1304–1308 – Dante's Convivio discusses vergogna as fear of dishonour.^[4]
• 1374 – Petrarch uses it for a person or thing that brings disgrace.^[4]
• 14th century – The plural vergogne names the genitals.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. shame, the painful feeling caused by an act or behaviour, one's own or another's, felt to be wrong or dishonourable: Arrossì di vergogna davanti a tutti.^{[6][12][13][1]}
2. embarrassment, shyness: Ha vergogna di parlare davanti alla classe.^[6][12][14]
3. disgrace, dishonour; as an exclamation, an expression of strong disapproval: Che vergogna!^[6][14][11]
4. A person or thing that is a disgrace: Questo parcheggio è una vergogna.^[6][12][14]
5. (in the plural, euphemistic or jocular) The genitals.^[6][11][1]

Word family

• vergognarsi
• vergognoso
• svergognare
• svergognato
• svergognatezza

Related words

• verecondia
• verecondo
• Latin verecundia

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini (1997–), Opera del Vocabolario Italiano, CNR, Firenze; tlio.ovi.cnr.it
3. ^ a b c Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 4022
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k 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 c d e f g De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
7. ^ Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier
8. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
9. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
11. ^ a b c Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
12. ^ a b c Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
13. ^ Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
14. ^ a b c Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli