Italian Occurrences of 'molto gravissima' and 'molto gravissimo': The Italian "hyper-superlative"'s Trajectory from Acceptability (13th to 16th centuries) to Banishment
Ephraim Nissan and Giorgio Marchetti
Abstract
This article traces the historical trajectory of the Italian “superlative of the superlative”, with a focus, here, on the forms molto gravissimo and molto gravissima. The trajectory was from widespread acceptability in medieval and early Renaissance Italian to later stigmatisation and exclusion from the normative language. Through a philological survey (which we keep appealing and readable) of texts from the 13th to the 16th century, the study documents how the Latin-derived suffix ‑issimo could be further intensified by popular adverbs such as molto or assai, producing reinforced superlatives that were neither rare nor marginal. Significant occurrences are examined in the Tuscan translation of Albertano of Brescia’s Latin treatises, in Leon Battista Alberti’s I libri della famiglia, and in a Valtellinese list of miracles dated 1493–1494. Our present study considers the sporadic survival of the construction in modern Italian, typically in humorous, substandard, or metalinguistic contexts, including a television sketch by the famous 1960s comedians Sandra Mondaini and Raimondo Vianello. Drawing on (among others) Giovanni Nencioni’s reflections on the historical tightening of grammatical norms, the article argues that the “hypersuperlative” was once a legitimate expressive resource of Italian, later suppressed by prescriptive standardisation but never entirely extinguished in actual usage.
Contents
Abstract
Introduction
A TV comedy sketch of Sandra Mondaini and Raimondo Vianello
An occurrence of molto gravissima in the book of “family conversation” by Leon Battista Alberti
A Journal volume of 1893, and a Valtellinese list of miracles from the 1490s
Gerhard Rohlfs attributed molto gravissimo to Albertanus of Brescia
Giovanni Nencioni’s explanation of how the phenomenon (which combines a Latinate superlative with a popularistic superlative) transitioned from accepted usage, to unacceptability
One finds molto gravissimo as the title (and initial words) of an English-language jazz song by Alain Pizzolato, a French lyricist and songwriter
One finds questo facto è molto gravissimo in Soffredi del Grazia’s volgarizzamento (Tuscan translation) of a Latin moral treatise by Albertanus of Brescia (Albertanus Brixiensis, Albertano da Brescia)
Superlatives formed out of other than an adjective
What Bruno Migliorini’s history of the Italian language states about the superlative of the superlative in the Duecento (13th century), Trecento (14th century), and Quattrocento (15th century)
Lionardo Salviati
Derivations of the type ARCI+adjective+ISSIMO in Bergantini’s dictionary of 1745
ARCI+departicipialnoun+augmentative+pejorative+ISSIMO in the entry ARCI-SCIOPERATONACCISSIMO, ‘super-extra-bloody-mega-slacker’ for one who shuns work, in Bergantini’s dictionary of 1745
How Bray’s La grammatica italiana puts it
When the applying the superlative or the comparative to the superlative ceased to be acceptable (and a philological mystery clarified)
Concluding remarks
1. Introduction
Up to the end of the 16th century, the (now long banished) syntax forming a superlative of the superlative was accepted. One can find a flurry of examples. There is an occurrence of molto gravissimo (the popularistic superlative with molto being applied to the Latinate suffixal superlative formed with -issim-) in Soffredi del Grazia’s Tuscan translation (of 1278, edited by Sebastiano Ciampi) of a Latin treatise by Albertano of Brescia (c. 1195 – c. 1251); an earlier Tuscan version had been made (in Paris in 1268) by Andrea of Grosseto (but some codes are damaged). These were researched by the philologist (and important professor of chemical pharmacology) Francesco Selmi (1817–1881). Andrea was deliberately not using the Grossetan dialect; he referred to the language of his vulgarisation as “italic”. One finds molto gravissima, in the feminine, in a list of miracles ascribed to the Madonna from the 1490s, in documents on parchment from Valtellina. That document was published in an article in the Periodico Storico Comense, Vol. 10, of 1893, and that volume contains an unrelated reference to the medieval Albertano de Canio, archpriest of St Laurence church in Chiavenna (in the Valchiavenna Alpine area: Chiavenna is north of Lake Como, Valchiavenna is north and northwest of that lake, whereas Valtellina is to the east of the northern tip of the lake). Clearly an obscure character, whereas the writings of Albertano of Brescia (in the original Latin, or in translations to a number of European or Italian vernaculars) were influential. In the 15th century, one also finds Leon Battista Alberti using molto gravissima in a moral treatise (he is best known as an architect). Just as Albertano went out of fashion as a personal name, so did the “hypersuperlation” syntax come to be normatively spurned. One does come across occurrences from the 20th and 21st century, either with humorous intent, or because individuals with substandard mastery of Italian who are now able to post their texts on the Web, or to be quoted on the Web, happened to resort to that now ungrammatical reinforcement of the superlative. However, as Bruno Migliorini had pointed out, there had been a period of time, at least from the 13th century to the 16th included, when the superlative of the superlative was permitted.
2. A TV comedy sketch of Sandra Mondaini and Raimondo Vianello
If anybody in Italy’s school system was to write, by way of a superlative of the superlative of an adjective for ‘severe’, molto gravissima, he or she would get a very bad mark. Or then, one finds it occurring in a video clip of the very popular TV comedians Sandra Mondaini (1931 – September 2010) and Raimondo Vianello (1922 – April 2010, married Sandra in 1962). Let us state right away, why, in an article in linguistics, we are using a particular comedy sketch of that couple. What is the linguistic, indeed, sociolinguistic point? Raimondo Vianello tells over the phone a lady he barely knows, but whom he fancies, that the situation is quite serious (“gravissima”), or “rather, very quite serious, as you would say” (“anzi, molto gravissima, come dice Lei”). This clearly indicates to the viewers that the lady he is phoning is quite poorly educated.
In the sketch now at https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=637092475807810, Raimondo Vianello is told by his wife, Sandra Mondaini, that at the city’s registry office, there is no record they are married, so by law, they are unmarried, and they must do something. Raimondo Vianello phones right away a lady he is courting, but of whom he knows very little, and tells her “È successa una cosa gravissima. Anzi, molto gravissima, come direbbe Lei” (“Something quite serious has happened. Actually, very quite serious, as you would rather say”): so Vianello is using molto gravissima metalinguistically, by admittedly imitating how his interlocutor would, he assumes, would express herself (this clearly indicates to the viewers that the lady he is phoning is quite poorly educated). He urges that other lady that, given that “Mia moglie! Mia moglie non è più un problema!” (“My wife! My wife is no longer a problem!”) , they should meet. But then, disappointed, he says: “Ah, Lei il marito ce l’ha ancora” (“Oh, you, you still have your husband”).
So let us recapitulate. Apparently, Sandra Mondaini has just returned from the Registry Office.- She tells Raimondo Vianello that they do not appear as being married. She is upset and theatrical (as usual with that actress), and exclaims something dramatic. But the punchline is his. Raimondo, instead of comforting her, rushes to the double bed, grabs the phone, and calls another woman. And, in a perfect Vianello twist, he corrects her imagined ignorance by saying “molto gravissima”, which is what she, being ignorant, would supposedly say (thus, also conveying the point that the situation is even beyond being very serious). The other woman replies that she is still married — which collapses his plan. This is classic Mondaini–Vianello: her theatrical panic, his dry opportunism, and the final comic reversal.
In the sketch considered, in character for his dry, self‑important persona, Vianello is patronising towards the second woman, even as he is courting her. He tells that other lady (while sitting on his wife’s bed!) that he expects her to say something ungrammatical, and he says it. There is a double function of this move of his. He is being patronising to her, while showing us he does not mind his intellect, only, presumably, her good looks. But he also conveys to viewers the notion that he is telling her that the situation is suited by something even stronger that the superlative.
Whereas his wife as dramatised tries top convey a sense of urgency to remedy a legal situation concerning their mutual status which she had just discovered and which she finds intolerable, he, Vianello, is gladly excited at the opportunity. His wife saw a superlatively inconvenient situation that has to be redressed immediately. He sees a superlatively exciting situation that he should be quick to seize. It’s pure Vianello: pedantic, opportunistic, and wrong in a way that reveals his own vanity.
We had to go over this again, so as not to flatten something that is considerably layered. In being patronising, he pre‑attributes an ungrammatical form to the other woman — he “quotes” the kind of thing he expects her to say, and in doing so, he’s the one who actually utters the malformed molto gravissima. The error is framed as hers, but performed by him. There is a double function of the move. Toward her, the second woman: he is not quite implicitly saying, “You’re the sort of person who would say something like this”, reducing her to a pretty ignoramus whose language he can correct while still desiring her. And toward us (the viewers): he signals that the situation exceeds even the normal superlative — so extreme that it “needs” a super‑superlative (which would beneath his persona to use himself, but she, who would be unself-conscious at being ungrammatical, can be expected to utter. But it is he who utters it at her). The ungrammaticality becomes an index of excess: the situation is beyond grammar, beyond norms.
Note that Vianello is addressing the woman he wants to marry (now that he is officially unmarried), by using the deferential third person singular (Lei, not tu). Note, in this still, that the husband is sitting on a double bed, so his seeking another wife is all the more outrageous towards his heretoforth wife. There is an asymmetry of perception: Mondaini sees a superlatively inconvenient situation — her marriage has evaporated in the records; it must be fixed. Vianello sees a superlatively exciting situation — bureaucratic erasure as erotic opportunity. Her crisis is his chance. Mondaini’s body broadcasts urgency and repair. Vianello’s body and face broadcasts opportunistic delight. Vianello uttering “molto gravissima” functions as a fake quote from the other woman, a patronising projection, and a visual marker that he’s linguistically and morally overstepping. The key is that Mondaini and Vianello are not just in different emotional registers — they are in opposite moral geometries around the same event.
The latter instance, from the results of a search on the Web, has molto and gravissima juxtaposed. However, they belong to different sentences. Of course, that occurrence is not relevant for documenting the awkward syntax molto gravissima. In full-text information retrieval, the very possibility that such a situation would occur (namely, false positives being retrieved) is something one needs bear in mind.
In contrast, in the following three instances, we come across an occurrence from Radio Radicale of somebody expressing himself or herself ungrammatically with molto gravissima, and next, of somebody who uses molto gravissima in a mix of standard Italian and dialectal discourse. The third instance is from a website based in Brazil, even though the text is in Italian, and we find there an ungrammatical molto gravissima, but in all capitals, while decrying the extrajudicial execution of a senior terrorist, as part of acts of war on the part of a regular army against terrorists benefiting from state-in-a-state circumstances where the Lebanese state was unable to stand up to very powerful militias exploiting its territory (so the legalistic posture of that webpage is inappropriate):
3. An occurrence of molto gravissima in the book of “family conversation” by Leon Battista Alberti
An occurrence from the 15th century is found in a text by a famous author, Leon Battista Alberti. Born in Genoa to a Florentine father, in 1404, he died in Rome, 1472. He studied in Padua and Bologna, lived for a while in Florence (where his father was allowed to return in 1428), and in 1431 moved to Rome, where he became a priest, and entered the service of the papal court. It was his study of ancient ruins in Rome, which motivated him to become an architect.
Leon Battista Alberti was an architect indeed (which is traditionally considered to have been his primary occupation, or rather, the one for which he is best known: he designed two churches in Mantua, and he also designed buildings in Florence and Rimini, as well as a square in Pienza), as well as a humanist and a polymath: a theorist of painting and of architecture, a poet, a linguist, philosopher, and cryptographer.
Leon Battista Alberti’s I libri della famiglia (The Books of the Family) are a treatise in the form of a conversation among members of the Alberti family. I libri della famiglia discuss education (which in his opinion, required reform), marriage, household management, and money: matters of great interest to family life. It wasn’t until 1843, that this work by Alberti was printed. Alberti gave that work to his family to read, but was disappointed as some relatives even ridiculed it.
In the fourth book (Libro Quarto) of I libri della famiglia, a work written in Tuscan as a literary language, but with books bearing a Latin title (Liber quartus familie: de amicitia), the adjective gravissima occurs several times, as a search in its text available on the Web shows (https://it.wikisource.org/wiki/I_libri_della_famiglia/Libro_quarto). In one instance, one finds a character named Adovardo (Edward, which now in standard Italian is Edoardo) give an erudite exposition, while nevertheless using the expression molto gravissima:
ADOVARDO. Tu m’induci ch’io entri in materia qual volentieri qui in pruova fuggiva trattarne, per quanto m’ingegnava, breve e succinto, transcorrendo presto, qui finire questa quale m’imponesti opera di recitarvi quello sento della amicizia; e tirimi in nuovo favellare della inimicizia, ché sai allo inimico sta avere modo e ragione in sostenere e vendicarsi delle iniurie. E delle iniurie, alcune sono alla persona nostra fatte, alcune sentiamo a noi con danno essere gravi in nostre cose; e fra le nostre cose s’ascrive e annumera la fama, la dignità, l’autorità e nome, e simili carissimi e ottimi amminiculi per confermarsi a felicità e gloria fra’ mortali. Ma qui alcuni non bene interpretano, e reputando molesto e dannoso a sé chi era da nulla stimarlo, pigliano ad animo inimicizia non lodata. Qual prudente orando in conzione causa alcuna molto gravissima, e in mezzo monstrando suo ingegno ed eloquenza, riputasse inimico quell’asino, e preponesse vendicarsi, quale raghiando el disturbasse? O quale non stolto in quel giuoco lupercal antico, in quale, dice Plutarco, nobili giovani e posti in magistrato, nudi correndo faceano con ferze aprirsi via dalla moltitudine, restasse di certare correndo per acquietar quel cane quale el perseguita abbaiando? Così in vita chi con virtù e degne opere promulgando sue laudi molto stimasse le voce d’un bestiale uomo, o chi con ottimi studii e con tutto l’animo incitato a gloria interrompesse el principiato corso suo occupando sé stessi ad asentare uno abbaiatore e vilissimo detrattore? Mai sì nostro officio con opere lodatissime palesarli mendaci e fitti. Pirro, re Epirotarum, domandò alcuni giovani se così fusse che bevendo insieme avessero detrattoli molto e biasimatolo, com’egli udiva. Risposero: «E quanto assai; e se più avessimo beuto, molto più saremmo stati intemperanti». Credo rise.
That is to say:
ADOVARDO. You are causing me to enter into a subject I would gladly avoid discussing here, as far as I could, briefly and succinctly, moving quickly, to finish this work you have imposed on me, to recount to you my feelings about friendship. And you draw me to speak again of enmity, since you know it is, for the enemy, right and proper that having suffered harm, he would avenge offences. And of offences, some are inflicted on us personally, some we feel are detrimental to our affairs; and among our affairs are ascribed and numbered fame, dignity, authority, name, and similar most precious and excellent auxiliary supports [amminniculi for ammennicoli] for securing happiness and glory among mortals. But some misinterpret this, and considering anyone who was esteemed by none, to be troublesome and harmful to themselves, they take to heart unworthy enmity. What prudent man, expounding knowleadgeably about some really very grave [molto gravissima] cause, and displaying his wit and eloquence, would consider that donkey an enemy, and would prefer to take revenge on the one who disturbed him with his barking? Or who, not foolish, in that ancient Lupercal game, in which, says Plutarch, noble young men and officials, running naked, used whips to clear the way for the crowd, would stop to run and quiet the dog that pursued him with barking? Likewise, who in life, by promulgating his praises with virtue and worthy deeds, would greatly esteem the voice of a bestial man, or who, by excellent studies and with all his soul incited to glory, would interrupt his begun course, occupying himself with hearing a barking and most vile detractor? Never has our office so greatly exposed them as mendacious and guilty with most praiseworthy deeds. Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, asked some young men if it was true that by drinking together they had defrauded him greatly and blamed him, as he heard. They replied: “Very much indeed; and if we had drunk more, we would have been much more intemperate”. I believe he laughed. […]
Alberti’s subject in this passage is elevated, and he also adopts a high register, and yet, his usage of Tuscan mixes in some traits one would now deem to have been colloquialisms.
4. A Journal volume of 1893, and a Valtellinese list of miracles from the 1490s
The expression molto gravissima is mentioned in a journal volume of 1893 in an article by G. F. Damiani that refers to three short documents on parchment from 15th-century Valtellina (a long valley to the east of lake Como). Of these documents, the first carries a date (Thursday, 10 June 1493). In the same journal volume, two documents published there or quoted from it — but unrelated to Damiani’s article — mention the medieval Albertano de Canio, archpriest of the church of St Laurence in Chiavenna.
All three documents published in Damiani’s 1892 article enumerate supposed miracles ascribed to the Madonna, and in fact, the third document (relating events which, when dated, range between March and April 1494, and October and November, which can be presumed to be of that same year), wrote precisely that: molto gravissima.
The context was a man in a castle who was so ill, that the physicians despaired of saving him (“Ancora Bartholomeo del castelo da muso [i.e., of the castle in the town of Musso on Lake Como] del laco da como: hauendo lui una certa infirmita molto gravissima in modo che li medici lo haueuano abandonato”: our boldface. This is the occurrence of molto gravissima).
This Bartholomeo allegedly prayed to the Madonna and promised to send her one golden ducat, and once this was done, recovered: “Se ricordo de questa Madona fazando lui deuotamente la deuotione sua zoe de mandarghe uno ducato doro et lo mando, et statim fato questo fu liberato die V octobris”. See on p. 212 in the Periodico Storico Comense, Vol. 10 of 1893, which we reproduce below.
We downloaded a digitally scanned copy (now in the public domain) of a bound book. Here you are given the option to download the volume in various formats; we recommend downloading it as a pdf file. Between the two covers of the bound book there are of more than one yearly book of that journal, because at the very beginning., the year of publication is 1892, and the volume number is 9. Damiani’s article, however, appears in Vol. 10, of 1893. Damiani’s entire article, “Pergamene valtellinesi del secolo XV”, begins on p. 207 and ends on p. 213.
5. Gerhard Rohlfs attributed molto gravissimo to Albertanus of Brescia
In his quite important historical grammar of Italian and its dialects, Grammatica storica della lingua italiana e dei suoi dialetti (in three volumes: Fonetica. Morfologia. Sintassi e formazione delle Parole), published by Einaudi in Turin between 1966 and 1969 — which for many years, decades ago, one of the authors of the present article (Ephraim Nissan) used to treat as a cherished livre de chevet of his — Gerhard Rohlfs mentions (in §404, on p. 85 in Vol. 2, which is about morphology) an occurrence of molto gravissimo to “Albertano da Brescia”, i.e., the notary and legal counsellor Albertanus of Brescia (c. 1195 – c. 1251), who was an author of very influential Latin social treatises and sermons, used by authors in Italy, France, England, Spain, and Germany. A Tuscan version of those Latin works was made by Andrea of Grosseto, but the Tuscan version relevant for our present purposes is the one made by Soffredi del Grazia. The occurrence of molto gravissimo is in a Tuscan translation indeed. Did Rohlfs misattribute the occurrence to Albertanus of Brescia? Probably not: rather, his must have been a shorthand, fully expecting readers to understand that, as Albertanus’ original text was in Latin, the Italian superlative of the superlative rather was from one of the vulgarisations.
We have not checked in the original, German-language version of that historical grammar: Historische Grammatik der italienischen Sprache und ihrer Mundarten (published by Lehnen in Munich in 1949–1954). The Italian edition was improved and augmented, with respect to the original. After having been out of print for nearly thirty years, in 2021 Rohlfs’ historical grammar was published again, this time in Bologna by Il Mulino, but it was not reprinted as is. Rather, in collaboration with the Accademia della Crusca, the new edition is augmented with further material. Our present article refers instead to the Einaudi edition.
Rohlfs is the subject of a biography: Salvatore Gemelli, Gerhard Rohlfs: Una vita per l’Italia dei dialetti, Gangemi Editore, Rome, 1990.
6. Giovanni Nencioni’s explanation of how the phenomenon (which combines a Latinate superlative with a popularistic superlative) transitioned from accepted usage, to unacceptability
Giovanni Nencioni wrote in La Crusca per Voi (no. 8, April 1994), and the Accademia della Crusca published it again on 25 October 2002 (at Formazione dei superlativi e dei comparativi - Consulenza Linguistica - Accademia della Crusca):
Il suffisso -issimo del superlativo assoluto viene dal latino e arricchisce, col suo valore oggettivo, i modi popolari della comparazione, esprimibili col suffisso accrescitivo -one (bellone, bellona, sapientone, fatalona) o con varie gradazioni apprezzative (assai contento, molto contento, ben contento, arcicontento) o con la ripetizione dell’aggettivo e dell’avverbio (nero nero, dolce dolce, forte forte). Gli antichi usavano anche rafforzare o moderare la forma latinistica incrociandola con quella popolare (molto gravissimo, assai dolcissimo) e anche con la forma comparativa (quasi il più antichissimo). Ma questa antica libertà è stata tarpata dalla sopraggiunta disciplina grammaticale.
Le forme comparative possono però essere formate con elementi diretti non ad intensificare la base ma ad esaltarla qualitativamente: come dicendo ambiguamente suggestivo, misteriosamente reticente, inestricabilmente confuso, dove la pur lunga misura degli avverbi aggiunge una qualità a quella denotata dagli aggettivi, e non indispone come qualcosa da sostituire con sinonimi più spediti e più efficaci, ma sempre esistenti. Il senso di fastidio all’intensivo estremamente è dato dalla sua eccessività in quella funzione, che non gli è abituale nella nostra lingua; eccessività che produce una svalutazione della sua efficacia e quindi un effetto d’inerzia. E l’inerzia, diminuendo la significanza, accresce la misteriosità della parola. […]
That is to say:
The suffix -issimo of the absolute superlative comes from Latin and enriches, with its objective value, the popular forms of comparison, expressible with the augmentative suffix -one (bellone, bellona, sapientone, fatalona) or with various appreciative gradations (assai contento, molto contento, ben contento, arcicontento) or with the repetition of the adjective and adverb (nero nero, dolce dolce, forte forte). In Old Italian, they also used to strengthen or moderate the Latin form by crossing it with the popular one (molto gravissimo, assai dolcissimo) and even with the comparative form (quasi il più antichissimo). But this ancient freedom has been curtailed by the eventually enforced requirement of discipline in using grammar.
Comparative forms, however, can be formed with elements designed not to intensify the base but to qualitatively enhance it: as in ambiguamente suggestivo, misteriosamente reticente, inestricabilmente confuso, where the long length of the adverbs adds a quality to that denoted by the adjectives, and does not annoy, as if it were something to be replaced with quicker and more effective synonyms, which still exist. The sense of annoyance with the intensive estremamente (‘extremely’) stems from its excessiveness in that function, which is not customary in our language; an excessiveness that devalues its effectiveness and thus creates an effect of inertia. And inertia, by diminishing its significance, increases the mysteriousness of the word. […]
7. One finds molto gravissimo as the title (and initial words) of an English-language jazz song by Alain Pizzolato, a French lyricist and songwriter
“Alain Pizzolato is a French lyricist and songwriter whose writing blends poetic imagery, emotional depth, and subtle irony”. On the Web, one comes across this statement:
At 71, I wrote “Molto Gravissimo” — a slow jazz blues track with a smoky cabaret feel, in tribute to the old pianos, the tired lovers, and the music that refuses to die.
The two quotations are from Stream Alain Pizzolato music | Listen to songs, albums, playlists for free on SoundCloud and 00095820-1 | Chanson paroles et musique | Molto pianissimo respectively. At Molto gravissimo .mp3 by Alain Pizzolato one can listen to a lady singing that song in English, but she begins by uttering “Molto gravissimo”.
8. One finds questo facto è molto gravissimo in Soffredi del Grazia’s volgarizzamento (Tuscan translation) of a Latin moral treatise by Albertanus of Brescia (Albertanus Brixiensis, Albertano da Brescia)
In the medieval Italian volgarizzamento (translation into the vernacular) of the Latin moral treatises by Albertanus of Brescia, one finds the sentence “questo facto è molto gravissimo” (“this act/deed is very serious”). It emphasises the severity of an “injury and a newly committed misdeed” (’ngiura e del maleficio nuovamente comesso) and the potential for even graver consequences in the future. One can download the book where this occurs, from here. It is the Library of Congress copy of a book published in Florence by Allegrini and Mazzoni (typesetters for the archbishopric) in 1832, and contains the translation made by Soffredi del Grazia, a notary public from Pistoia in Tuscany, no later than 1278, of the moral treatises of Albertano (Albertanus), who was a judge in Brescia. That edition was edited by the abbot Sebastiano Ciampi. The book was dedicated to… Gagarin. For sure, not to the astronaut Iuri Gagarin, but rather to Prince Gregorio (Grigoriy) Gagarin, an envoy of the Tsar.
The occurrence of molto gravissimo is at the beginning of what a jurist is claimed to have stated, upon hearing the counsel for Sir Melibeo, who extolled not only the case of his clinet, but also and especially how rich powerful he and his family are, how inferior his opponents are in those respects, and demanding that Sir Melibeo be promptly avenged (sic). The jurist argues that both parties are rich and powerful, and what is worse, they are neighbour, and one could expect that much worse that what has already taken place, may take place in future. He therefore advises the plaintiff to make it his priority not to incur harm (rather than to exact revenge).
Soffredi del Grazia (Pistoia, ca. 1240 – Pistoia, 1297) was a notary public, as well as a politician in his city. He went to Provins (in the Île-de-France) in December 1275, where he devoted himself to translating into Tuscan vernacular the philosophical treatises of Albertanus of Brescia (already translated in 1268 by Andrea da Grosseto), which were transcribed in Pistoia no later than 1278 (when they already were extant there).
The following five pages reproduce the relevant part of the 1246 Latin text by Albertano of Brescia, published in 1873 as Albertani Brixiensis, Liber consolationis et consilii (edited by Thor Sundby), Havniae [Copenhagen]: Fred Høst & Filium, 1873. It was also printed, on that year, in London by both Williams & Norgate, and “pro Societate Chauceriana N. Trübner & Co”. Indeed, this was in the miscellaneous studies of the Chaucer Society, Second Series, no. 8. Our arrow indicates the word “arduum” in the Latin original, a word which was rendered with “molto gravissimo” by Soffredi del Grazia.
On p. 22 in Ciampi’s edition of Soffredi del Grazia, one can read a statement made by a jurist, after having heard the praise of Sir (Messer) Melibeo and of his and his relatives’ power and assets, and a disparagement of the assets of his enemies (our added boldface):
questo facto è molto gravissimo per rascione de la ’ngiura, e del maleficio nuovamente comesso, e molto piuo gravi potrebero Avenire per inanzi, e per questa cascione, e anchora è gran facto perciò che sono vicini, e per Rascione de la richeza e de la potenzia de 1’una parte, e de l’altra; e per molte Altre Rascioni, le quali non si possono pensare chosì lievemente, né no serebe convenevile di contarle quie, e perciò, chonciò sia chosa che in su questo facto si debia procedere saviamente, consiliamo che la tua persona sopra tucte le cose guardi sì, che neuna chosa ti menimi.
That is to say:
This fact is extremely serious, because of the harm caused, and of the malefaction recently perpetrated, and that much worse could take place in future, and moreover, it is an important fact that they are neighbours, and because of the affluence and power of this party and of the other; and for many other reasons, which cannot be thought about with levity, and which it would not be convenient to relate here, and therefore, so that concerning this fact one may proceed wisely, we advise that thou in person be especially careful that nothing would damage thee.
9. Superlatives formed out of other than an adjective
The Italian suffix -issimo (m. sing.) or -issima (f. sing.), -issimi (m. pl.) or -issime (f.pl.), forms the absolute superlative, and it does so while forming adjectives out of adjectives. And yet, sporadically one comes across an epithet (a noun): il campionissimo, about a particular champion, or the proper name of a TV programme (Canzonissima).
Or then, think of generalissimo, an Italian noun being a military rank: English adopted the Italian form of the term, so what in Spain is el generalísimo Franco is, in English, Generalissimo Franco, and in Italian il Generalissimo Franco. Russian instead has генералиссимус, from Latin generalissimus. It was the commander Albrecht von Wallenstein who, in 1632, was the first to become the generalissimus of the Holy Roman Empire. In China and then Taiwan, there was Generalissimo Chiang Kai-Shek. In 1914, in the French army, Marshall Joseph Joffre had, as commander in chief, the title généralissime. From 26 March 1918, as Allied commander, Ferdinand Foch was the généralissime. In 1821–1822, José de San Martín was Generalísimo de las Armas del Perú.
In the following, the page numbers are those of the 1994 edition (published by Bompiani in Milan) of Bruno Migliorini’s Storia della lingua italiana. One may even come across the absolute superlative of a verbal form. On p. 209, Migliorini remarked that it was idiolectal, i.e., “un vivace stilema individuale” of the Dominican theologian and preacher Giordano da Rivalto (c. 1255–1311) — known in English as Jordan of Pisa, and who stands out because he was the first preacher whose sermons in vernacular Italian were preserved — and not part of the language of his times, when he said in a sermon: “andronne in ninferno? Sì bene, ritto, ritto, correndissimo” (“Will I go [andrò] because of that [ne] to Hell? Yes indeed, straight away, straight away, in quite a hurry”), where he had taken the gerundive correndo ‘while/by running’ and formed (irregularly) its superlative correndissimo. One comes across a superlative formed out of a personal pronoun. On p. 427, Migliorini remarked about the physician Francesco Redi (1626–1697), that he wrote “Si accorse esser lui luissimo” (“He noticed that it was him, quite him”), and that Redi justified that invention with there having been the precedent of Giordano da Rivalto coining correndissimo, as we have just pointed out.
10. What Bruno Migliorini’s history of the Italian language states about the superlative of the superlative in the Duecento (13th century), Trecento (14th century), and Quattrocento (15th century)
The Italian linguist and philologist Bruno Migliorini (1896–1975), from 1949 to 1963 was president of the Accademia della Crusca, which is the academy of the Italian language; from 1931, he taught at the University of Rome (though with a parenthesis: in 1933 he took a chair of Romance philology at the University of Fribourg in Switzerland) the course of Storia della lingua italiana: it was the very first time such a course was introduced at a university in Italy. From 1939, he taught that course at the University of Florence. Importantly, he was interested in the history of Italian without confining it to how it was written in the belles lettres. His research contributed to a better understanding of the language of the 20th century and of its development. See MIGLIORINI, Bruno - Enciclopedia - Treccani.
Migliorini authored Storia della lingua italiana, one of the first scientific histories of the Italian language (indeed, the first extensive one), first published in 1960. Which was by the Sansoni publishing house in Florence: that same publisher still reprinted it in 1987. From 1994, it was published by Bompiani in Milan, until 2017. Then, in 2019, Bompiani published a new edition in paperback, in the Tascabili Bompiani series, subseries Saggi. In turn, it, too, has been reprinted.
In this section, we are going to consider how in Storia della lingua italiana, Migliorini pinpointed historical forms of usage of the superlatives that contrast with their present-day syntax.
Again, the page numbers are those of the 1994 edition of Migliorini’s Storia della lingua italiana. Migliorini pointed out on p. 211 that the superlative as formed with -issimo has historically occurred as a relative superlative; for example, in Dante’s Convivio, II, xi, 14, one finds: “la Rettorica è soavissima di tutte l’altre scienze” (“Rhetoric is the suavest of all branches of knowledge”).
Italian has Latinate absolute superlatives formed other than with the suffix -issim-; namely, one finds for example ottimo for ‘best’, pessimo for ‘worst’, infimo for ‘lowest’, teterrimo ‘most horrible’, and English, too, has the rare Latinate adjective teterrimous, defined in the Web’s Wiktionary as “Extremely foul or ugly; horrible; terrible” (teterrimous - Wiktionary, the free dictionary).
In the 13th century, Migliorini pointed out on p. 150, it was acceptable to reinforce superlatives with other intensive words; he gave these two examples: in Brunetto Latini’s Rettorica, chapter 38, one finds (concerning the sophist, rhetorician, and pre-Socratic philosopher Gorgias of Leontinoi in Sicily, c. 483 – c. 375 B.C.E.) “Gorgias Leontino, il più antichissimo rettorico” (Λεοντῖνοι, the only ancient Greek settlement in Sicily that is not located on the coast, being nearly 10 km inland, is the present-day city of Lentini, located 35 km (22 miles) north-west of Syracuse).
And in the 1887 critical edition by Egidio Gorra of the Istoria troiana (as “vulgarised”, i.e., translated into Italian, in 1333 by Mazzeo di ser Giovanni Bellebuoni; but Migliorini included that example in his chapter about the Duecento, not Trecento): “Cassandra cominciò a fare sì grandissimo pianto” (“Cassandra began to do such very great weeping”).
On p. 266, Migliorini explained that historically, one comes across the superlative being reinforced by intensive words: “la più ottima parte de’ mortali” [“the very best part of mortals”] (Matteo Palmieri [1405–1475, a Florentine humanist and politician], Vita civile, Proemio); “più ottimo tempo” [“the very best time”] (Giovanni Cavalcanti [a Florentine chronicler, 1381–c. 1451], Istorie, 1. XIV, chapter 35); and, about costumes, “molto lodatissimi” [“quite praised”] (Leon Battista Alberti, Fam., p. 123 Spong.); or about places, “tanto alla famiglia utilissimi” [“so extremely useful for the family”] (Alberti, ibid., p. 119); and that in Masuccio, one finds “assai dolcissime parole” (“very, very sweet words”). Tommaso Guardati (1410–1475) is known as Masuccio Salernitano. He was a poet, and also authored Il Novellino, a collection of fifty tales.
Finally, on p. 357, Migliorini notes that even in the 16th century superlatives sometimes occur with intensifying adverbs: “beono sempre i più pessimi vini” (“they always drink the very worst wines”) (Pietro Aretino [poet, writer, and dramatist, 1492–1556], La Cortigiana, III, sc. 6).
We will now repeat, enlarged for improved readability, p. 150:
11. Lionardo Salviati
Let us also consider a text, actually a grammar, by Lionardo Salviati (1539–1589), a Florentine who in 1566 became consul of the Florentine Academy (it has evolved to become the now extant Accademia di Belle Arti di Firenze; it was founded on 13 January 1563 by Cosimo I de’ Medici, under the influence of Giorgio Vasari, the painter, architect, art historian, and author of Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects).
Lionardo Salviati was from a family closely linked to the House of Medici. He was among the main promoters of the founding of the Accademia della Crusca, with the long-term project (which he did not live long enough to see come to fruition) of a major dictionary.
In Salviati’s text with which we are concerned here — the Avvertimenti della lingua sopra ’l Decameron (about the language of Boccaccio’s prose in his collection of tales, the Decameron), published between 1584 and 1586 — there is a section dedicated to superlatives in which Salviati attests, without explicitly condemning it, the use of the superlative and other forms of superlative reinforcement. We are going to reproduce here the front matter, and then the chapter about the superlatives, which is on pp. 8–13 in Salviati’s book. He remarks, for example, that Boccaccio wrote ottimissimo, and that Fra Giordano (i.e., Giordano da Rivalto, Jordan of Pisa) had più precede -issim- superlatives.
The following seven pages reproduce the text about the superlative. Next, we are going to consider the same, but as in the 1712 edition.
We now turn to the 1712 edition of Salviati’s Avvertimenti.
12. Derivations of the type ARCI+adjective+ ISSIMO in Bergantini’s dictionary of 1745
In the early modern period, the Accademia della Crusca (Academy of Bran, supposed to sift the Italian lexicon) in Florence became the ultimate authority about the Italian lexicon. As Marcello Aprile observes1, the prestige acquired by its first dictionary — the Vocabolario degli Accademici della Crusca, published in 1612 — led many later lexicographers to declare explicitly, often already in the title itself, their adherence to the authority represented by the Accademia della Crusca.
This was also the case with Gian Pietro Bergantini, who entitled his dictionary, printed in Venice in 1745, Voci italiane d’autori approvati dalla Crusca nel vocabolario d’essa non registrate con altre molte appartenenti per lo più ad arti e scienze che ci sono somministrate similmente da buoni autori (“Italian words from authors approved by the Accademia della Crusca, not recorded in its vocabulary, together with many others pertaining mostly to the arts and sciences, likewise supplied to us by reputable authors”, a work that deserves particular consideration here because of its relevance to the present discussion.
Gian Pietro Bergantini (Venice, 1685–1764) was a clergyman of the order of the Theatines (whose secretary he was in Rome for a while), a preacher, and (from 1726 in Venice) a man of letters. As the latter, he was a translator, but he also authored works about the Italian language. Of these, the main work was a dictionary which it took him twenty years to write. According to the French Wikipedia entry on Bergantini, in the dictionary “he added to the words and phrases contained in that of the Academy of the Crusca, a great number of others, supported by the authority of the best writers, and quotations from these authors. The first volume appeared under this title: Della volgare elocuzione illustrata, ampliata, facilitata, (this being a volume containing the entries of the letters A and B), published in Venice in 1740, in folio. The bookseller who had begun this enterprise at great expense could not sustain it, and the publication was limited to this single volume. The author later revised the entire work and reduced it from twelve volumes to six: he announced this reduction with a kind of prospectus entitled: Idea d’opera del tutto eseguita divisa in sei tomi che ha per titolo Dizionario italiano, etc., Venice, 1705, 18 p. quarto; but this prospectus tempted neither booksellers nor subscribers, and the work remained unpublished, as did many others by the same author.”
The entry “Bergantini, Gian Pietro” authored by Gian Luigi Beccaria for the Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, Volume 9 (1967), now available at BERGANTINI, Gian Pietro - Enciclopedia - Treccani, offers an in-depth discussion of Bergantini’s work as a lexicographer. As Beccaria explains, Bergantini in a sense competed with the Accademia della Crusca: his dictionary published in Venice in 1745 contains terms drawn from works by authors approved by the Crusca but not yet recorded in its dictionary, and also includes technical terminology. It was much praised, and even Vincenzo Monti, who criticised Bergantini harshly, praised that particular work of his. In 1746, an unofficial reprint of the Dictionary of the Academy of the Crusca was published in Naples, and it drew upon the 1745 dictionary by Bergantini, who of course complained about his work being pillaged in oirder to compete with him. He included his complaint in another book: his Dizionario italiano, ovvero Voci di scrittori italiani separatamente da quelle che sono sul vocabolario
Bergantini’s dictionary of 1745 is now accessible online in facsimile format at ETH-Bibliothek Zürich, with the shelf mark “Rar 3888”. The file comprising the entries under the letter A (the permanent link is https://doi.org/10.3931/e-rara-41471) contains on pp. 25 to 27, which we reproduce below, many entries that are really quite interesting for the subject of our present study. These entries begin by the prefix arci- (for ‘arch-’), but also comprise the suffix -issim-.
The adverb ARCIABBONDANTEMENTE ‘copiously’ is defined by resorting to adverbializing an -issimo superlative of the adjective abbondante by resorting to the suffix -mente: “Abbondantissimamente”.
For ‘quite very much beloved’ we get the entry ARCIAMATISSIMO, which is defined as a superlative of arciamato (but we find there the typo “Arcimato”). Then there is an entry ARCIBELLISSIMO for ‘extremely beautiful’, defined as a superlative of “Arcibello”, which itself is the next entry: ARCIBELLO is defined as “Trabello” (‘extra-beautiful’) and “Bellissimo”. And then we find again an adverb: ARCIBENISSIMO for ‘very, very well’.
Note a Florentine feature: ARCIBONISSIMO from buono ‘good’, not *arcibuonissomo. The u is not maintained, before the o, because the stress is no longer on the o, in the form bonissimo of the superlative.
We also find ARCICARISSIMO from caro for ‘dear’ or ‘costly’. And ARCIDEVOTISSIMO from devoto ‘devout’. We found an adjective and an adverb for ‘quite thinned out’: ARCIDIRADISSIMO, preceded by the entry for the adverb derived from it, which it ARCIDIRADISSIMAMENTE.
We find and entry for the adjective ARCIDOTTISSIMO, for ‘really quite erudite’, but there is no entry for *arcidotto. The definition is “Dottissimo al maggior segno”, i.e., ‘erudite in the extreme’.
The entry ARCIELOQUENTISSIMO is defined as “Di là da eloquentissimo”, i.e., ‘beyond quite eloquent’. As one can see, the definitions illustrate a rich gamut of options for describing the superlative degree, without resorting to suffixes or prefixes.
The entry ARCIFACILISSIMO ‘easy-peasy’, ‘quite straightforward and easy’, even includes an illustration by comparison: “More than quite easy, which is like gulping a fresh egg”.
Likewise, in the entry ARCIFASTIDIOSISSIMO for ‘really quite annoying’: “More than quite annoying, which is worse than a fly”. And under ARCIFECONDISSIMO: “More than quite prolific, which is as prolific as a hare”.
Other entries are ARCIFORTISSIMO ‘really quite strong’, ARCIFORTUNATISSIMO ‘lucky in the extreme’, and the entry ARCIFREDDISSIMO for ‘the coldest conceivable’, which is defined by resorting to “Trafreddissimo”, itself derived by having a prefix for ‘extra-’ precede a superlative.
Page 25 ends with the entry ARCIGRANDISSIMO for ‘beyond very big/great’.
On p.26, ARCIGRATISSIMO from grato is synonymised with “Arcicarissimo”, from which we can infer that the sense gradito ‘welcome’ of grato was intended, rather than ‘thankful’. And then we get ARCILATINISSIMO for ‘really quite Latin’, and ARCILUNGHISSIMO for ‘very, very long’, and ARCIMINUTISSIMO ‘itsy-bitsy’, ‘teeny-tiny’ (cf. piccino piccino picciò), ‘really quite minuscule’.
Consider how in Spanish (and Judaeo-Spanish), from poco ‘little’ you can have the diminutive poquito, but also poquitito, or even poquititito. The latter is supposedly more common in casual conversation in Mexico rather than in Spain, but one of the present authors (Ephraim Nissan) was told, several years ago, by the linguist Prof. Yaakov Bentolila in his office at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Beer-Sheva, Israel, that poquititito is used in Judaeo-Spanish (his own is the Moroccan rather than the Aegean or Jerusalemite variety).
Other entries on p. 26 are ARCIMIRABILISSIMO for ‘really quite admirable’, and the awkward ARCINEGGHIENTISSIMO (defined as a superlative of “Arcinegghiente”), where negghiente is a Middle Italian term for ‘nothing’ (niente in standard Italian); ARCINFINITISSIMO ‘as infinite as conceivable’ (given the sense of infinito, the definition given in the dictionary comes across as absurd: “which surpasses infinite, more than infinite”); ARCIOCCUPATISSIMO ‘really quite busy’; ARCIOPALISSIMO (indicated as jocular) ‘as much an opal as it is possible to be an opal’, or ‘as opaline as it is possible to be opaline’; ARCIORDINATISSIMO ‘well-ordered in the extreme’; ARCIPICCIOLISSIMO ‘really quite minuscule’; ARCIPIENISSIMO ‘full in the extreme’; ARCIPOETICHISSIMO ‘as poetic as conceivable’; ARCIPOSSIBILISSIMO ‘really quite possible’; ARCIRARISSIMO for ‘very, very rare’; ARCIRICCHISSIMO for ‘very, very rich’; ARCISCIOCCHISSIMO for ‘hugely, unsurpassably stupid’; and then an entry to which we are going to devote the next section.
Still on p. 26, we find ARCISOLENNISSIMO for ‘really quite solemn’, and after the adjective ARCISOTTILE for ‘quite thin/subtle’, ARCISOTTILISSIMO defined as a superlative of the former. The last two entries on p. 26 are ARCISTIMATISSIMO for ‘really quite well esteemed’, and ARCISTUPENDISSIMO for ‘beyond, beyond stupendous’.
The entry ARCISTUPENDO is the first entry on p. 27.
ARCITRASONISSIMO is defined as “More pompous than Thrasos (Trasone), a glorious soldier”, where in Greek mythology, Θρασος, “THRASOS was the personified spirit (daimon) of rashness, insolence, recklessness and excessive boldness. He was a companion of Hybris and Ate, malevolent spirits of arrogance and delusion”, in the words of a portal on Greek mythology (THRASOS - Greek God or Spirit of Rashness & Insolence), where the source is given as follows:
Aeschylus, Agamemnon 763 ff (trans. Weir Smyth) (Greek tragedy C5th B.C.):
“But an old Hybris (hubris) tends to bring forth in evil men, sooner or later, at the fated hour of birth, a young hubris and that irresistible, unconquerable, unholy spirit (daimon), Thrasos (Recklessness), and for the household black Ates (Curses), which resemble their parents. But Dike (Righteousness) shines in smoke-begrimed dwellings and esteems the virtuous man.”
ARCIVALENTISSIMO ‘really quite valiant’ and ARCIVERISSIMO ‘quite true, really’, these, too, on p. 27, conclude the list of entries instantiating the phenomenon of derivation we have been discussing in the present section.
13. ARCI+departicipialnoun+augmentative+ pejorative+ISSIMO in the entry ARCISCIOPE-RATONACCISSIMO,‘super-extra-bloody-mega-slacker’ for one who shuns work, in Bergan-tini’s dictionary of 1745
Let us say something more about the list of entries in Bergantini’s dictionary of 1745 which begin by arci- and end by -issimo or (if an adverb) -issimamente. It is interesting that as recently as 1745, Bergantini’s dictionary still allowed the use of numerous words formed from ARCI + adjective + ISSIMO, for example, ARCIGRANDISSIMO or ARCIPOETICHISSIMO, which, however, he did not explicitly consider a superlative of the superlative, but rather a simple superlative, even though for some entries the definitions he provided already contain a superlative form, thus effectively turning them into superlatives of the superlative. For example, ARCIBELLISSIMO is defined as the superlative of arcibello, which in turn is glossed by the superlative form bellissimo.
In modern grammars, we read that to form the superlative, ARCI + adjective/noun is sometimes used. Consequently, for us moderns, ARCIGRANDISSIMO is a superlative of the superlative, but this was not the case for our 18th-century Italian ancestors.
Under the entry ARCISCIOPERATONACCISSIMO (for ‘super slacker’, at present we would say super fannullone in Italian) — this is the entry we had left out in the previous section, when we announced we would be discussing it here instead — it is explicitly acknowledged that this goes even beyond the superlative of the superlative:
ARCISCIOPERATONACCISSIMO: Scioperatone di là dal superlativo del superlativo. Red. lett. Da questo strabocchevole esempio ben si comprende quanto con la particola Arci si estenda la libertà della lingua.
The original wording of the entry for a term that is quite peculiar is of particular interest. It states that it denotes a scioperatone ‘certified slacker’ “beyond the superlative of the superlative”. Admittedly, it belongs in a literary register (“lett.”). And then the entry avers: “From this far too excessive example it is clear how much the freedom of language is extended by means of the arci- particle”.
The word arciscioperatonaccissimo exhibits a sequence of suffixes, apart from the prefix:
ARCI+departicipialnoun+augmentative+pejorative+ISSIMO
There exists in Italian a departicipial noun scioperato for ‘slacker’, ‘one who shuns work or efforts’. The definition in the entry we considered considers the augmentative form scioperatone. But then after the augmentative suffix ‑one, we find the pejorative suffix ‑accio, which is in turn followed with the superlative suffix ‑issimo, and on top of this, also the prefix arci- was applied. Four levels of reinforcement can be found in this example. And they are stacked on each other.
Italian is quite rich when it comes to derivational suffixes (diminutives, endearments, pejoratives, augmentatives), but in this domain Polish is significantly richer and more productive than even Italian. Both Italian and Polish have that kind of suffixes, but they behave very differently.
Polish has a huge variety of diminutive suffixes, as well as stacking (multiple suffixes in one word), cross‑category productivity (nouns, names, adjectives, adverbs), fine‑grained emotional nuance, and regional creativity. Italian has all of these, but it is in the layering that Polish is considered to outclass Italian, with each layer adding emotional nuance. For example:
kot → kotek → koteczek → koteczuś → koteczunieczka
dom → domek → domeczek → domeczunio
The Italian example arciscioperatonaccissimo shows that this is also possible in Italian. However, Italian and Polish differ in how acceptable such layering would be. In Polish it is more acceptable than in Italian it would be.
Even though Bergantini explicitly invoked in his dictionary the authority of the Accademia della Crusca — “the Academy of the Bran”, whose stated mission was to admit only “good” lexical items — he nevertheless included the entry arciscioperatonaccissimo, only to berate it afterwards as “strabocchevole”, that is, “overflowing” or “over the top”.
In Polish it would not be over the top, in some registers of the language. Italian has a beautiful, expressive system when it comes to derivational suffixes, but it is more regularised and less combinatorial in this than Polish. Stacking is normal in Polish. Semantic nuance is also stacked: tiny shifts in affection, irony, contempt. The practice in Polish is more socially embedded: in nicknames, family forms, and regional variants. So in this regard, Italian is expressive, but Polish is explosive. What is excessive in Italian, is not excessive in Polish.
In Modern Hebrew, even though the derivational means of the language are much more rigid, the wildly neologising writer, poet, and translator from Russian, Avraham Shlonsky (1900–1973) tried to emulate the Slavonic potential for stacking emotional suffixes, by having a character callout to a cat (ḥatúl): ḥatúl, ḥatulón, ḥatulilón! By stacking two devices of diminutivisation, ḥatulilón is already overstretched. And that word got its own entry in the Dictionary of Shlonsky’s Neologisms by Yaakov Knaani, published posthumously in 1989.
14. How Bray’s La grammatica italiana puts it
Let us now turn to an E-book published in 2012 by the Roman publisher Treccani (formally: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana), La grammatica italiana, edited by Bray. Its bibliographical entry in full is as follows:
La grammatica italiana. Direttore editoriale Massimo Bray. Consulente scientifico Giuseppe Antonelli. Hanno collaborato al volume Flavio Santi e Matteo Viale. Istituto della enciclopedia italiana fondata da Giovanni Treccani, Roma, 2012.
At present, it is accessible online (but with no indication of the editor: Massimo Bray). In particular, we are interested in a passage in the entry for SUPERLATIVO. We reproduce the following from the entry for SUPERLATIVO:
Nell’italiano antico era possibile costruire il superlativo relativo anche con il suffisso ‑issimo
E come la rosa, il più bellissimo de’ fiori, è circondata di spine (L’Ottimo Commento della Divina Commedia)
e anche rafforzare il superlativo assoluto
apparvegli uno angelo molto bellissimo e di chiaro abito (D. Cavalca, Dialogo di san Gregorio volgarizzato).
That is to say:
[In Old Italian, it was possible to construct the relative superlative with the suffix ‑issimo:
And as the rose, the very most beautiful of flowers, is surrounded by thorns (from the commentary to the Divine Comedy known as the Ottimo)
and also to reinforce the absolute superlative:
an angel appeared to him, most very beautiful and in bright clothing (from Domenico Cavalca [who was himself a Pisan Dominican friar (c. 1270–1342)], Dialogue of Saint Gregory translated into the vernacular).]
15. When the applying the superlative or the comparative to the superlative ceased to be acceptable (and a philological mystery clarified)
One last matter we haven’t addressed thus far, and which we now proceed to address, is when (and who) decided that the hypersuperlative (the superlative of the superlative), as well as the comparative as applied to the superlative, should be banished from the Italian language.
Without any claim to having resolved the issue once for all, in further research (based on Migliorini’s indications) we reached the period from 1722 to 1724 (we also searched the oldest online grammars, from the 17th century, but found only indications or instructions on how to form the superlative and the comparative, nothing else).
In 1722, Gerolamo Gigli, in his Lezioni di lingua toscana, published “Presso Bartolomeo Giavarina, Venezia” (Lessons on the Tuscan Language. At Bartolomeo Giavarina, Venice) states on page 44 that:
tra gli Scrittori riportati dal Salviati, e dal Bartoli trovansi non pochi usi di strano favellare, come più maggiore, sì bianchissimo, così fortissimo &c. Che oggi non sarebbe questo modo che nella bocca d’Oltramontani Novizi del nostro Idioma.
[among the writers reported by Salviati and Bartoli, there are many uses of strange language, such as più maggiore, ‘more greater/greatest’, sì bianchissimo ‘so whitest’ (but it is correct in the sense ‘so very white’), così fortissimo, ‘so stringest’ (but it is correct in the sense ‘so very strong’), etc. such that today this way would only be in the mouths of transalpine novices of our language.]
The adjective Maggiore in Italian functions as both a superlative and a comparative. (It can also be used as a noun: as a rank in the army, or then as in I miei maggiori, that is ‘my elders’.)
In 1724, Nicolò Amenta, in his Della lingua nobile e del modo di leggiadramente scrivere in essa, non che di perfettamente parlare. Parte seconda, published “Nella Stamperia ed a spese di Antonio Muzio, Napoli” (On the noble language and the way of gracefully writing in it, as well as of speaking perfectly. Part two. In the printing house and at the expense of Antonio Muzio, Naples), on page 239, states that:
Non fan bene perciò quei che a’ nomi che son da se stessi comparativi, come Maggiore, Minore, aggiungon le accennate particelle per ingrandire o scemar maggiormente dicendo Più maggiore, Men maggiore, o Men minore; quantunque si truovino in più testi di lingua sì fatti modi di parlare.
[Those who add the aforementioned particles to names that are themselves comparative, such as Maggiore (largest), Minore (smallest), to make the word more or less significant, by saying Più maggiore (more largest), Men Maggiore (less largest), or Men minore (less smallest), are not doing well; although such ways of speaking are found in many language texts.]
The relevant scanned pages are shown below.
This rule probably came into being in the 18th century, but it is nevertheless significant that around the same time there were, on the one hand, such grammarians who wanted to prohibit the use of the hypersuperlative (such as Gerolamo Gigli in 1722 and Nicolò Amenta in 1724) and, on the other hands, such lexicographers who documented in their dictionaries entries that were hypersuperlatives in all respects (even if they did not explicitly recognise them as such, as evidenced by the case of Gian Pietro Bergantini with his dictionary of 1745).
A harbinger of the banishment on modifying Maggiore by having it preceded by più to express the comparative degree stacked upon Maggiore as a comparative or superlative, can already be found in a grammar authored by the priest Benedetto Buommattei (Florence, 1581–1647), who apart from being a grammarian also wrote about Dante’s Divine Comedy, and who from 1640 was the secretary of the Accademia della Crusca: he warned against using più maggiore. His grammar Della lingua toscana (which remained unfinished) was published in two volumes: the first volume in 1623 (in Venice by Gio[vanni] Salis), and then in 1643, both volumes (in Florence, by Zanobi Pignoni). It is considered the first logically structured grammar of the Italian language. In Vol. 2 (but only in the editions of 1760 and 1807, which we reproduce below), in a note in Chapter IX “De Comparativi e Superlativi”, he wrote:
Presso gli antichi nostri Scrittori si trova aggiunto il più anche a maggiore, come si può vedere negli Avvertimenti dello Infarinato vol. 2. lib. I. cap. 4. ma è maniera di parlare da non seguitarsi oggidì, né si usa se non da alcuni de’ nostri lavoratori.
[Among our old authors, one comes across più (more) added even to maggiore (largest), as one can find in the Avvertimenti by the Infarinato (i.e., Lionardo Salviati), in his Vol.2, Book I, Chapter 4, but it is a manner of speaking that should not be maintained nowadays, and it is not used other than by some of our menial workers.]
Buommattei’s Della lingua toscana is a major 17th‑century grammar, “major” especially because its impact was such it both motivated and resulted from it being reprinted many times in the 18th century, often with added notes by later scholars. The edition of 1807 states clearly that it was based on the versions of 1714 and 1760.
There is a philological mystery involved. The first version of Buommattei’s grammar that was consulted for the purposes of our present study was the edition of 1807. It came as a surprise that the text of the quotation appeared in neither the edition of 1643, nor in previous versions which date from 1714, 1729, 1733, and 1751.
The text of the quotation does appear, instead, in the edition of 1760.
The preface to the 1760 edition states that further to the annotations to Buommattei’s grammar that had been made by the abbot Anton Maria Salvini (1653–1727), on later occasions more notes were added:
Alle Note dell’Abate Salvini altre ne sono state aggiunte più copiose, e più stese, che illustrano, limitano, e schiariscono gli insegnamenti e i sentimenti dell’Autore.
[To the notes by Abbot Salvini, sometimes further ones were added, which are more numerous and more extensive, and which illustrate, limit, and clarify the teachings and the the sentiments of the Author (i.e., Salvini, or then Buommattei).]
Salvini was, in his days, a well‑known erudite priest (he made translations from Greek, Latin, and Hebrew) whose philological notes circulated widely in manuscript and were frequently appended posthumously to editions of classical and linguistic texts. He was a Florentine scholar, translator, and member of the Accademia della Crusca.
As the Wikipedia entry states, Anton Maria Salvini graduated in 1679
with a doctorate in canon and civil law. He was sent to work under a lawyer Andrea Poltri, but passed the time reading and studying texts. He was not functioning well or interested in being a lawyer, but he gained among some the reputation of an excessively erudite polyglot and polymath, profusely quoting the ancient footnote to any new statement. Italian writers of the 19th century, like [Ugo] Foscolo and [Luigi] Settembrini, were strongly repulsed by his urge to base knowledge on recondite and archaic sources. Francesco Redi is said to have commented that: And from a full glasses and overflowing / in such sweet demeanor my heart he touches / That to laugh again will not be enough / He, my Salvini, who has so much tongue in his mouth. [Ei da un colmo bicchiere e traboccante / In sì dolce contegno il cuor mi tocca,/Che per ridirlo non saria bastante / Il mio Salvin, che ha tanta lingua in bocca.]
Biographies of Anton Maria Salvini are accessible on the Web:
Cordaro, Carmelo (1906). Anton Maria Salvini. Saggio critico biografico. Piacenza: Bertola & c. [288 pages].
Paoli, Maria Pia (2005). “Anton Maria Salvini (1653-1729). Il ritratto di un letterato nella Firenze di fine Seicento” (PDF). Naples, Rome, Florence: Une histoire comparée des milieux intellectuels italiens (XVII-XVIIIe siècles). Rome: École française de Rome, pp. 501–544.
At any rate, this exploration shows that it was in the 18th century, rather than in the 17th, that reinforcements of the Italian superlative came to be banished.
Below, we reproduce the title page and the chapter “De Comparativi e Superlativi” from the 1643, 1714, and 1729 editions.
16. Concluding remarks
Some of the data presented were already known to historical linguists, as can be seen from what Migliorini, Rohlfs, and Nencioni had written in recent generations, and Salviati had written during the Florentine Renaissance. Our present readers will hopefully agree that this survey has been instructive.
In particular, it was interesting to consider occurrences from our own lifetime, and a spectrum of situations in which the archaic or ungrammatical molto gravissimo or molto gravissima occurred. (We have included the bibliographical references directly in the text, in part because resources found online were especially important or handy in the making of this article).
“Il Vocabolario della Crusca come unica filiera possibile tra il 1612 e il 1820 per i dizionari italiani: differenze con la Francia”, in Il Vocabolario degli Accademici della Crusca (1612) e la storia della lessicografia italiana. Atti del X Convegno ASLI Associazione per la Storia della Lingua Italiana (Padova, 29-30 novembre 2012 - Venezia, 1dicembre 2012), ed. by L. Tomasin, Firenze, Franco Cesati Editore.
Citation
Nissan, E. and Marchetti, G. (2026). Italian Occurrences of molto gravissima and molto gravissimo: The Italian “hypersuperlative”’s Trajectory from Acceptability (13th to 16th centuries) to Banishment. Aletheia - A Journal of Literary and Linguistic Studies, Vol. II, Number 54. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.20050104
TYPE: Research Article
The full text is available for free on Academia.edu
Opera curiosa ed interessante come sempre è lo sviluppo del linguaggio. Un impegno monumentale per gli Autori. Complimenti.