pentimento

American  

[pen-tuh-men-toh] / ˌpɛn təˈmɛn toʊ /

noun

Painting.

• pentimenti
  plural

1. the presence or emergence of earlier images, forms, or strokes that have been changed and painted over.

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pentimento British  

/ ˌpɛntɪˈmɛntəʊ /

noun

1. the revealing of a painting or part of a painting that has been covered over by a later painting

2. the part of a painting thus revealed

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• pentimenti
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of pentimento

1900–05; < Italian, equivalent to penti ( re ) to repent (< Latin paenitēre to regret) + -mento -ment

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

pentimento pentimenti

Like a pentimento, their brilliance began to gradually appear from beneath the tarnish, reflecting my face in their mirrored surfaces.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 1, 2026

There are holes drilled into the top and the pentimento outline of where the displaced sculpture once stood.

From Washington Post ● Aug. 23, 2022

It's so common that art historians and conservators have a word for it: pentimento.

From Salon ● Nov. 11, 2021

The pentimento of the teenage Blasey made her seem achingly vulnerable.

From New York Times ● Sep. 29, 2018

It’s as though the image of the first baby Vincent emerges from under Vincent's, a pentimento uncovered, and in their parents’ eyes the portrait of that hoped-for “good boy” melds with Theo's.

From "Vincent and Theo: The Van Gogh Brothers" by Deborah Heiligman

The unfinished figure of the executioner evidently caused the artist much trouble, for pentimenti are frequent, and other outlines can be distinctly traced through the nude body.

From Giorgione by Herbert Cook

There are many pentimenti on the marble parapet, which seems to have been painted over the dress.

From Giorgione by Herbert Cook

Albertinelli, on the contrary, when he painted and repainted his Annunciation, washed out the under layer with essential oil before making his "pentimenti" or corrections, and in this way the thinness was kept.

From Fra Bartolommeo by Flora Kendrick

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