Etymograph

English

pentimento

Pentimento comes from Italian pentimento ‘repentance, penance, penitence’, and goes back to Proto-Indo-European *peh₁- ‘to hate, hurt’.

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*peh₁-1‘to hate, hurt’root named by Wiktionary
  2. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEpaeniteo2as paenitēre‘to cause (someone) to regret or repent’
  3. Late Latinc. 200–600 CE(sē) paenitīre2
  4. Italianc. 1300–presentpentìrsi1‘to repent’
  5. Italianc. 1300–presentpentimento1‘repentance, penance, penitence’
  6. Englishearliest quotation 1831pentimento1

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, English pentimento
  2. 2 Wiktionary, Italian pentirsi
  3. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1831, Henry Fuseli, The Life and Writings of Henry Fuseli: “The companion of this picture is the Madonna dressing…”.

Lineage

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*peh₁-Wiktionary, English pentimento‘to hate, hurt’root named by Wiktionary
  2. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEpaeniteoWiktionary, Italian pentirsias paenitēre‘to cause (someone) to regret or repent’
  3. Late Latinc. 200–600 CE(sē) paenitīreWiktionary, Italian pentirsi
  4. Italianc. 1300–presentpentìrsiWiktionary, English pentimento‘to repent’
  5. Italianc. 1300–presentpentimentoWiktionary, English pentimento‘repentance, penance, penitence’
  6. Englishearliest quotation 1831pentimentoWiktionary, English pentimento. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1831, Henry Fuseli, The Life and Writings of Henry Fuseli: “The companion of this picture is the Madonna dressing…”

The story

[Alt: A blue-tinted painting of a man's bent neck, with a faint image of a woman's face in its background] Pentìrsi is derived from Latin paenitēre, the present active infinitive of paeniteō (‘to cause to repent; to repent; to be sorry, regret’), from Proto-Indo-European *peh₁- (‘to hate; to hurt’).

Full etymology on Wiktionary

Linked words

through Proto-Indo-European *peh₁- ‘to hate, hurt’

patient, passionate, passive, compassion, patience, compatible, fend, fiend, repentance, repentant, penitential, 6 more

through Latin paeniteo ‘to cause (someone) to regret or repent’

penance, repent, penitentiary, penitent, penitence, 5 more

Today it means

noun The presence of traces of a previous work in an artistic or literary work; especially (painting) an image which has been painted over but is still detectable.

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “pentimento”; the older steps come from the Wiktionary entry for Italian pentirsi. By Wiktionary contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0, via kaikki.org (dump of Oct 3 2026); text adapted and restructured. Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word. License.

Etymograph / Proto-Indo-European *peh₁- / pentimento

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