Etymology

staccato

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Today it means: An articulation marking directing that a note or passage of notes are to be played in an abruptly disconnected manner, with each note sounding for a very short duration, and a short break lasting until the sounding of the next note; as opposed to legato. Staccato is indicated by a dot directly above or below the notehead. Full definition →

Italian staccato ← Middle French destacher ← Old French destachier
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The story

  1. Proto-Indo-European · derived from*(s)teg-“stick, stake”
  2. Proto-Germanic · derived from*stakkaz
  3. Frankish · derived from*stakkā“stake”
  4. Old French · derived fromdestachier“to detach”
  5. Middle French · derived fromdestacher“to detach”
  6. Italian · borrowed fromstaccato“detached, disconnected”
  7. English todaystaccato

Borrowed from Italian staccato (“detached, disconnected”), past participle of staccare (“to detach, separate”), aphetic variant of distaccare (“to separate, detach”), from Middle French destacher (“to detach”), from Old French destachier (“to detach”), from des- + atachier (“to attach”), alteration of estachier (“to fasten with or to a stake, lay claim to”), from estache (“a stake”), from Low Frankish *stakkā (“stake”), from Proto-Germanic *stakkaz, *stakô (“stick, stake”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)teg- (“stick, stake”). Akin to Old High German stecko (“post”) (German Stecken (“stick”)), Old Saxon stekko (“stake”), Old Norse stakkr (“hay stack, heap”), Old English staca (“stake”). More at stake.

Words from the same roots

Old Frenchdestachier all →

detach

Frankish*stakkā all →

attach

Proto-Germanic*stakkaz all →

stacksea stack

Proto-Indo-European*(s)teg- all →

staytilethatchsea stack

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.