scesa

Scesa is a word in the Italian language that functions primarily as the feminine singular past participle of the verb scendere, meaning to descend or go down. In standard usage it appears in compound tenses with the auxiliary essere, and it agrees in gender and number with the subject when forming the periphrastic forms of the verb.

As a participle, scesa is used to describe a feminine subject that has completed the action of descending. For example, in the sentence La ragazza è scesa dal treno, the form indicates that the girl has descended from the train. The same participle can be the feminine form in other tempi: Era scesa prima di mezzogiorno. When used as an attributive adjective, it agrees with the noun it modifies, e.g., una figura scesa dalla collina.

Etymologically, scesa derives from Latin descendere, and its feminine form mirrors the gender agreement that characterizes Italian past participles. The corresponding masculine form is sceso, and the plural forms are scesi (masc./mixed) and scese (females). In contrast, the standard noun for a descent or downward movement is discesa; scesa is not commonly used as a standalone noun in contemporary Italian and is mainly found in verbal constructions.

In contemporary usage, scesa is most often encountered in written and spoken Italian where a feminine subject performs the action of descending, or as part of descriptive phrases where the feminine participle serves as an adjective. It is not a generic term for a descent, and speakers typically rely on discesa for noun use.