verro

Forms

verro m (plural verri)^[1] The oldest texts have Old Italian verre, Old Italian verru and Old Italian berro.^[2] The older form verre survived into the dictionaries as an archaism.^[3][4][5]

Etymology

It is inherited from Late Latin verrus (“boar”), a form recorded in the glosses, for classical Latin verres.^[6][7][8][9] The Italian ending -o comes from the move of the noun out of the class of nouns in -e.^[10][11][2]

The same word is Old French ver (the modern language has the derivative French verrat), Old Occitan verre, Catalan verre, Sardinian berre, Romansh ver and Romanian vier.^[6][12] Ibero-Romance has a derivative in -accu: Catalan verrac, Spanish verraco and Portuguese barraco.^[6][12]

In Latin the word meant first “the male” in general, as the Indo-European comparison shows; Venetian mascio “pig”, literally “male”, is a parallel.^[10][6][13] De Vaan reconstructs Proto-Italic *worsen- and Proto-Indo-European *h₂wŕ̥sen- (“male”).^[14] The cognates are Sanskrit वृषन् (vṛ́ṣan, “manly; male animal”), Ancient Greek ἄρσην (ársēn, “male”) and Lithuanian ver̃šis (“calf”).^[14][1] The double -rr- of the Latin word comes from an assimilated -rs-.^[6] Nocentini and Devoto connect the root with words for rain: to the stock-breeders the fertilising male and the fertilising rain were one idea.^[6][13]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLIO's first record is in the Milanese poems of Bonvesin de la Riva, from the late 13th century, and Nocentini dates the word to 1275.^[2][6] The sense was already the modern one: an uncastrated male pig kept for breeding.^[2] DELI quotes the Tuscan translation of Pietro de' Crescenzi (c. 1350): Castransi i verri di tempo di un anno; la qual cosa fatta, mutano il nome, e di verri son detti majali, “boars are castrated at one year old; once that is done they change their name, and instead of verri they are called maiali”.^[10]

Semantic evolution

The boar stood for strength and fury in comparisons: Fazio degli Uberti has someone who istava alla difesa come un verro, “stood on the defensive like a boar”, and Pulci's Rinaldo hurls himself into the fight come un verro.^[8][5] Tommaseo records the proverbial lussurioso come un verro, “lustful as a boar”, and forte come un verro, said of a sturdy young man.^[5] Giorgini used the word for the wild boar too, and Oudin listed the old form verre and the augmentative verrone, “big boar”.^[15][9]

Nocentini sees three tools as metaphors drawn from the boar's member and its way of penetrating: verrocchio “press” (1298), verrina “gimlet” (1311) and verricello “winch” (1550), all with a spiral part that turns as it enters a hole.^[6] In the southern dialects the word took on the sense “whim, fit of temper”.^[9][12]

Timeline

• 1275 – Nocentini's date of first record; the TLIO's first text is Bonvesin de la Riva's Milanese poems.^[6][2]
• 1298 – Verrocchio “press” is first recorded.^[6]
• 1311 – Verrina “gimlet” is first recorded.^[6]
• Before 1320 – GRADIT's date for the word.^[16]
• c. 1350 – The Tuscan translation of Crescenzi explains the difference between verri and maiali.^[10]
• 1550 – Verricello “winch” is first recorded.^[6]
• 18th century – Verro is recorded as the name of some boletus mushrooms.^[16]

Meanings

Noun

1. (zoology) A boar: an uncastrated male pig kept for breeding: Il contadino teneva un verro per tutte le scrofe del paese.^{[16][11][7][4]}

Word family

• verricello
• verrina
• verrocchio
• verrone

Related words

• porco
• maiale
• Latin verres
• French verrat

Usage notes

Verro is also a regional name of poisonous boletus mushrooms, especially Boletus satanas.^[16][17][8] Prati traces this sense to verrino, a bad mushroom like the porcino in Targioni Tozzetti, whence verro “poisonous mushroom” in Petrocchi.^[15] The simile forte come un verro is still current.^[11]

References

1. ^ a b c 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. ^ Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
4. ^ a b Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana
5. ^ a b c Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
7. ^ a b Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
8. ^ a b c Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
9. ^ a b c Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 4030
10. ^ a b c d Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
11. ^ 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
12. ^ a b c Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
13. ^ a b Devoto, Giacomo (1968), Avviamento alla etimologia italiana: dizionario etimologico, 2nd ed., Firenze: Le Monnier
14. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
15. ^ a b Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 1049
16. ^ a b c d De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
17. ^ Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)