The neologisms inside and outside the recent repertoires

Abstract

Around the year 2000 the Italian lexicography has delivered to the public at least two decisive works: the Grande dizionario italiano dell’uso, supervised by T. De Mauro, firstly in six volumes and then supplemented by two supplements, and the last volumes of the Grande DizionarioUTET (GDLI), started by S. Battaglia in 1961, which arrived at the conclusion of the alphabetical order with vol. XXI of 2002 and was supplemented by two supplements in 2004 and 2009. Such dictionaries are very open as for the contemporary language, and also have the merit of filling the obvious gaps left, especially with regard to foreign words. Since the first volumes of the GDLI, some repertoires dedicated exclusively to neologisms have been published. Among them we point out the two repertoires, which are related to each other, that G. Adamo and V. Della Valle published between 2003 and 2008. These and other minor repertoires (including some attempts of online dictionaries promoted by the Accademia della Crusca and the Istituto Treccani) have been reviewed. Particular attention has been paid to the dates and attestations provided, as well as to the presence in the dictionaries of many ephemeral and occasional multi-word expressions and words.