Etymograph

English

piazza

Piazza comes from Italian piazza ‘square, plaza’, and goes back to Proto-Indo-European *pleth₂- ‘to spread, extend’.

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*pleth₂-1‘to spread, extend’root named by Wiktionary
  2. Ancient Greekc. 800–300 BCEπλατεῖα2
  3. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEplatea2
  4. Italianc. 1300–presentpiazza1‘square, plaza’
  5. Englishearliest quotation 1913piazza1

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, English piazza
  2. 2 Wiktionary, Italian piazza
  3. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1913, Joseph Crosby Lincoln, New York: “Pretty soon I struck into a sort of path[…].…”.

Lineage

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*pleth₂-Wiktionary, English piazza‘to spread, extend’root named by Wiktionary
  2. Ancient Greekc. 800–300 BCEπλατεῖαWiktionary, Italian piazza
  3. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEplateaWiktionary, Italian piazza
  4. Italianc. 1300–presentpiazzaWiktionary, English piazza‘square, plaza’
  5. Englishearliest quotation 1913piazzaWiktionary, English piazza. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1913, Joseph Crosby Lincoln, New York: “Pretty soon I struck into a sort of path[…].…”

Linked words

through Proto-Indo-European *pleth₂- ‘to spread, extend’

flat, plane, plate, platinum, lateral, plat, plantain, flan, plaice, 15 more

through Latin platea

displacement, plaza, platz, 6 more

Today it means

noun A public square, especially in Italian cities.

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “piazza”; the older steps come from the Wiktionary entry for Italian piazza. 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 *pleth₂- / piazza

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