pisciuni

Sicilian

Etymology

From pisci (“fish”) +‎ -uni, literally “big fish”, because of its form. The formation “fish of the leg” can also be found in Lucania,[1] Sardinian pische de sa camba and Moroccan Arabic حوتة الرجل (ḥūtat er-rjal).

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

Noun

pisciuni m (plural pisciuna)

  1. calf (muscle of the leg)

Descendants
  • → Maltese: pexxun, pixxun, (obsolete) pixxul

References
  1. AIS: Sprach- und Sachatlas Italiens und der Südschweiz [Linguistic and Ethnographic Atlas of Italy and Southern Switzerland] – map 159: “la gamba; le gambe” – on navigais-web.pd.istc.cnr.it
  • Traina, Antonino (1868) “pisciuni”, in Nuovo vocabolario Siciliano-Italiano [New Sicilian-Italian vocabulary] (in Italian), Liber Liber, published 2020, page 3111
  • Pasqualino (c. 1790) “pisciuni”, in Vocabolario siciliano etimologico, italiano e latino (in Italian), volume 4, page 122
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