Becoming Italian Word by Word

Italian for Travelers: Ten Phrases to Know Before You Go

10 Phrases to Take to Italy

If you're packing your suitcases and heading for Italy in the coming months, some practical phrases are sure to come in handy. And so I'm launching a series of posts on "Italian for Travelers."  Let's begin with some essential and quintessentially Italian conversation starters. I'll be filling in more details and examples in the coming weeks:

1. Common courtesies. You’re more likely to get what you ask for when you preface a request with “per favore” (please) and respond to any kindness with “grazie” (thank you).  Prego can mean, “You’re welcome,” or, in some circumstances, “by all means.”

2. Salutations.  Although “ciao!”  has become world-famous, the more polite greeting is “Buongiorno" (Good day). An alternative more common in the North than the South is “Salve!”  Take your leave with a cheery "Arrivederci!" (See you again!)

3. Introductions. In Italian, you don't simply announce your name. You say, "Mi chiamo..." (I call myself).  To find out another person's name, ask, "Come si chiama?" (How do you call yourself?)

4. How are you?   When asked “come sta?” you might reply "bene" (well),  "molto bene" (very well) or non c’é male (not bad). If asked “come va?” (how’s it going),  the most common answer is the Italian equivalent of  “okay”: va bene (it’s going well). 

5. Asking for help.  If it’s a true emergency, shout “Aiuto!”  If you’d like help with something less urgent,  ask, “Scusi, può aiutarmi?"  (Excuse me, can you help me?) To acknowledge the kindness of a stranger, say, “Lei é molto gentile” (You are very kind).

6. Buying.  It’s possible to shop without words anywhere in the world, but the following phrases will serve you well in Italy: Quanto costa? (How much does it cost?)  Posso pagare con la carta di credito? (Can I pay with a credit card?)  “In cash" translates as in contanti.  If you want to try something on, ask “Posso provarlo?”

7. Time.  To find out  the time, you ask “Che ora é?” (what is the hour?) or "Che ore sono?" (what are the hours?). Italy uses a 24-hour clock (sistema orario a 24 ore) so that 6:00 p.m., for instance, is 18:00 (diciotto).  

8. Weather. Everyone talks about it everywhere, but in Italian weather (il tempo) “makes” rather than “is.”  “Fa bello” (literally makes beautiful) means “It’s a nice day.” Weather can also fa brutto (ugly), freddo (cold) or caldo (hot).  On a sunny day, "c’è sole” (there’s sun). "Cloudy" translates as coperto (covered) or nuvoloso; “it’s raining,” as piove.

9. Illness. “Sto male” means “I’m feeling bad.”   Common travellers’ complaints  include headache (mal di testa), stomach ache (male di pancia),  fever (febbre) and pain (dolore). 

10. Compliments. Che bello!  (How beautiful! How nice!) works in almost any circumstance.  With any luck, you’ll have many occasions to use it.

Words and Expressions

Sono americano/inglese/ francese, etc. -- I’m American, English, French, etc.

Non ho capito -- I didn't/don't understand

Può ripetere, per favore? -- Can you repeat, please?

Parla inglese? -- Do you speak English? 

Come si dice......in italiano? -- How do you say ...... in Italian?

Dianne Hales is the author of LA BELLA LINGUA: My Love Affair with Italian, the World's Most Enchanting Language. Click here for more information on her "writer's studio" in Capri this fall. 

Women of a Certain Age in the Italian Language

L'età del fascino

The Age of Charm

Meglio belli o meglio affascinanti? Better to be beautiful or better to be fascinating? This was the delicious question posed in an Italian newspaper’s column on “dilemmi beauty.”

A recent survey asked some two thousand American respondents when women reach the peak of their charm (raggiungono il picco del proprio fascino). The consensus: at age 30. They begin to age (cominciano a invecchiare) around age 41 and stop being sexy (smettono di essere sexy) when they reach age 53.

An Italian begged to differ. Tommaso Ariemma, docente di estetica e filosofiao (an instructor of aesthetics and philosophy), explained that there is una “cruciale” differenza (a crucial difference) between beauty and fascination.

Il fascino,he argues is direttamente proporzionale alla maturità (directly proportional to maturity), and women can acquire it only con il passare degli anni (with the passage of the years). While beauty is legata alla fisicità e al corpo (tied to the physical and the body), fascination requires un apprendistato (an apprenticeship). Solo con il passare del tempo (only with the passing of time) can a woman gain quella consapevolezza di sé (that self-awareness) that le ventenni (twenty-somethings) non possono possedere (can not possess).

So much for what Italians call la bellezza dell’asino (the fresh-faced appeal of youth)!

Dottoressa Ariemma suggests that questo periodo della vita (this period of life) begins around age 30 as a woman entra nel mondo del lavoro (enters the work world) and masters le strategie legate al prestigio sociale (the strategies tied to social prestige).

When does this period end? “Più difficile” (more difficult), he says, “stabilirne la fine” (to establish its end).

The researchers also posed la stessa domanda (the same question) about men. According to the respondents, gli uomini enter l’eta del fascino (the age of fascination) at age 34—and lose their allure by age 43. The docente’s response to this gender difference: "Questa mi sembra un'ottima notizia per le donne." (This seems good news for women.)

Perhaps women of every age would be better off if they paid less attention to their looks. According to an old Italian saying, “donna specchiante poco filante” (a woman looking in the mirror, or too conscious of her own beauty, is not that charming).

Words and Expressions

subire il fascino di -– to be under the spell of

vecchione, vecchiona –- very old man, very old woman

befana –- witch, old hag, ugly lady

bellezza al bagno -– bathing beauty

trattamento di bellezza –- beauty treatment

Dianne Hales is the author of LA BELLA LINGUA: My Love Affair with Italian, the World's Most Enchanting Language. Click here for more information on her "writer's studio" in Capri this fall. 

Celebrating Mamma in the Italian Language

La festa della mamma 

 Mother's Day 

Every year as the dark, cold winter gave way to the bright rebirth of Spring, the ancient Romans paid tribute to their gods of fertility. One holiday, Matronalia, was dedicated to Juno, the queen of the gods, and children gave gifts to their mothers on this day.  

Traditionally la festa della mamma in Italy fell on May 8. The current practice of celebrating Mother’s Day on the second Sunday of May (la seconda domenica di maggio) started in 1957.  

La mamma italiana is part of her family’s life every day of the year--as was mine (above), even though she was 100 percent Polish. Men may hold the highest political offices, but the person at the helm of the family—the strongest Italian institution—is Mamma. Grown men called mammoni (big mama’s boys) remain at home well into their thirties (and sometimes beyond). Mammismo (“momism”), some contend, stems from a son’s belief that nothing could ever compare with amore materno (motherly love). 

Mothers inspired the most common—and versatile --expression in Italian: Mamma mia! You can translate it as “My God!”, “How great!”, “Oh no!”, “Incredible!” and hundreds of other ways—depending on context and inflection. A wide range of human emotions--from surprise to shock, delight to disbelief, joy to horror--can be conveyed in these two words. 

To help children of all ages express their love for Mamma, Italian websites post “auguri” (best wishes) for la festa della mamma. Here are some exampes: 

*”Le rose sono rosse, le viole sono blu, e tu sei la mamma migliore di quaggiù.” (Roses are red, violets are blue, and the best mamma down here is you.) 

*”Mamma, sei la mia vita, sei come un raggio di sole che al mattino mi sveglia con felicità e come la dolce luce di una stella, che la sera accompagna il mio sonno.” (Mamma, you are my life. You are like a ray of sun that awakens me with happiness in the morning and like the sweet light of a star that accompanies my sleep in the evening.) 

*”Mamma, sei la cosa più bella e dolce che la vita mi potesse donare. Ti voglio bene!” (Mamma, you are the most beautiful and sweetest thing that life could give me. I love you!) 

Words and Expressions 

“come mamma l’ha fatto” -- literally as his mother made him: completely naked, in his birthday suit 

casa madre -- mother or head office 

scena madre -- main scene, the most dramatic and revealing scene in a movie or play 

cocco di mamma --mama’s boy, mammone

madre in affitto -- surrogate mother  

le gioie della maternità -- the joys of motherhood 

Dianne Hales  is the author of LA BELLA LINGUA: MY LOVE AFFAIR WITH ITALIAN,THE WORLD'S MOST ENCHANTING LANGUAGE. Click here for information on her "Writers' Studio" in Capri this fall.  

Here is a classic tribute to an Italian mamma: 

The Year of Italian Language and Culture: Machiavelli

Niccolò Machiavelli

As part of its celebration of "The Year of Italian Culture," Italy is commemorating the 500th anniversary of the writing of a classic work: Machiavelli's  Il Principe (The Prince). Although completed in 1513, the treatise by the man who "put the science into political science" wasn't published until 1532, five years after his death. Machiavelli's name since penetrated  the global vocabulary as an international byword for  political cunning and pragmatism. However, no one,  as T. S. Eliot observed, “was ever less Machiavellian than Machiavelli.” 

After fourteen years as a civil servant and diplomat in the Florentine Republic, Niccolò Machiavelli was tried, tortured, and exiled  after the Medici reclaimed power.  Frustrated in his forced retirement to his modest country home, Machiavelli began work on The Prince in the hope that a clear-eyed, no-nonsense tactical handbook would  display his political acumen and win him a government position. 

His  dreams, personal and political, never materialized. He died—“of a surfeit of failure,” one historian stated—before the printing of his masterwork. But by analyzing affairs of state dispassionately, with logic and objectivity, Machiavelli put the science into political science. 

Five centuries after Machiavelli’s time, The Prince still compels and shocks readers for two reasons: what its author says and how he says it. What if a prince acts so ruthlessly that he loses the adulation of his people?  Better to be feared than loved, shrugs Machiavelli. Since men are generally ungrateful, vacillating, cowardly, and greedy, he observes, they might promise their souls to a prince yet  desert or betray him because love is fickle, while fear is not.  Machiavelli never agonized over whether the ultimate end might justify any means.  He was sure it would.   

Just as remarkable as The Prince’s unflinching pragmatism is its language. Considered by some the finest Italian stylist of the Cinquecento (1500s),  Machiavelli wrote in a clean, stiletto-sharp  vernacular that echoed the everyday speech of his fellow Florentines (including, in some of his more ribald works, their earthiness). 

Machiavelli, whose satiric play The Mandrake is still revived and performed around the world,   couldn’t resist mocking the pretensions of some of his  newly prosperous countrymen.  In his own twist on bella and brutta figura, he recounts the story of a character named Castruccio.  A man from Lucca invites him to dinner at his house, which—thanks to a recent windfall--he has just remodeled in the most ostentatious manner possible. During the meal Castruccio suddenly spits in his host’s face. Rather than apologize, he explains that he did not know where else to spit without damaging something valuable.

Shortly before his death, the heart-broken political strategist wrote to a friend,  “I love my country better than my very soul.”  His country, which ignored him in life, didn’t know quite what to say of him in death. His  monumental tomb in Florence's Santa Croce, the burial site for Italy’s titans of history, reads simply, “To so great a name, no epitaph can do justice.”

Words and Expressions

machiavellismo –- political cunning

machiavellico –- crafty

machiavellicamente –- in a crafty manner

vivere da principe –- to live like a prince

principesco -– princely, prince-like 

Dianne Hales is the author of LA BELLA LINGUA: My Love Affair with Italian, the World's Most Enchanting Language. Click here for more information on her "writer's studio" in Capri this fall. 

How a Chocolate Kiss Is Like an Italian Mamma

Il Bacio Perugina e una mamma italiana

The Perugina “Kiss” and an Italian Mom

How is a world-famous chocolate made in Perugia like an Italian mother?

In a delightful essay published in a collection called Italianità, the author Alessandro Guerriero explains that Il Bacio Perugina is like una mamma italiana because:

*non cambia mai (it never changes).

*è un po’ troppo dolce (it’s a little too sweet), ma non priva (but not lacking) a certain tartness.

*come una mamma italiana d’altri tempi (like an old-style Italian mamma), it is ricca di sentenze (rich in sayings) che non servono assolutamente a nulla (that serve absolutely nothing) but make you smile. (Click here for some samples of frasi dei baci Perugina.

*come una mamma Italian d’altri tempi con gli abiti della festa (like an old-style Italian mom dressed in Sunday clothes), it is un po’ sognante (a little dreamy), un po’ futile (a little frivolous), un po’ fane’ (faded) but you become fond of these things because they make her stand out tra migliaia di altre mamme italiane (among millions of other Italian mothers).

*come una mamma italiana di altri tempi vestita con gli abiti della festa (like an old-style Italian mom  dressed in party clothes), it’s nice to encounter her ma non tutti giorni (but not every day).

*come tutte le mamme italiane è da prendere a piccole dosi (like all Italian moms she should be taken in small doses), altrimenti provoca “maldipancia” insormontabili (otherwise she provokes an insurmountable tummy ache).

Of course, there are many other types of kisses, including a mother's baci affettuosi (affectionate kisses). Friends might exchange a bacino or bacetto (little kiss), but you'd reserve a bacio sulla bocca (kiss on the mouth) or a baciozzo (slang) or bacione (hearty kiss or smooch) for a romantic partner. A date usually ends with a bacio della buonanotte (goodnight kiss). Lovers say goodbye with a bacio d’addio (parting kiss). But there's one type of kiss everyone want to avoid: il bacio della morte (the kiss of death).

Words and Expressions

mandare un bacio -- to throw a kiss

sbaciucchio -- continual kissing, smooching

sbacciucchiarsi -- to be always kissing one another,  to smooch, to canoodle (if anyone remember this word)

baciamano -- hand-kissing

Dianne Hales is the author of LA BELLA LINGUA: My Love Affair with Italian, the World's Most Enchanting Language.

Click below for a tribute to an Italian mamma:

An Ode to May in the Italian Language

Un omaggio a maggio

An homage to May

"Aprile con il fiore, maggio con il colore,"  Italians say, "April with its flower May with its color.”  May, one of my favorite months anywhere, is a particularly special time in Italy. As an old saying goes, “Di maggio s’innamorano anche le civette.” (In May even the owls fall in love.)

The month’s name derives from the Roman goddess Maia (dalla dea romana Maia), mother of Mercury, but in Christian culture (nella cultura cristiana) maggio is dedicated to the Madonna, the mother of Jesus.

Devout Catholics often will fare il mese di maggio (do the month of May) by reciting il rosario (the rosary) every day. This consists of a series of fifty prayers called the Ave Maria (Hail Mary), divided into five groups of ten.  Catholics keep  track of the number of prayers with una corona del rosario (a rosary crown).

May in Italy also is known as  il mese delle rose e delle spose (the month of the roses and the brides).  Le rose (roses) blossom during May, a popular time for le nozze (weddings).

May starts with il Primo Maggio (the first of May) and la festa del lavoro (the equivalent of America’s Labor Day) and includes a host of celebrations, including la festa della mamma (Mother’s Day).  But Italians never stop keeping an eye on the weather (il tempo) during this unpredictable month.

On May 16, the feast of Sant’Ubaldo, they warn: “Per Sant’Ubaldo, guardati dal freddo e non dal caldo” (for St. Ubaldo,  watch out for the cold and not the heat).  On May 22, the feast of Santa Rita, they delight that “per Santa Rita, ogni rosa è fiorita (for St. Rita, every rose is blossoming). On May 26, they observe: “Se piove per San Filippo, il povero non ha bisogno del ricco” (If it rains for St. Philip, the poor won’t need the rich).  Yet another weather prediction: Quello che fa maggio, fa settembre (what May does, September does).

Rain is the biggest preoccupation. According to one proverb, “una piovuta a maggio, se è sola che vantaggio!” (a rainfall in May, if just one, what a gain!).  Another cautions: “Maggio ortolano, molta paglia e poco grano” (literally the greengrocer’s--a rainy--May, lots of straw and little grain). 

If the sun shines, maggio brings ciliegie per assaggio (cherries to taste) and well priced produce. “Maggio soleggiato, frutta a buon mercato.”  (Sunny May,cheap fruit.)

The bottom line on this merry month:  Maggio caldo ti arricchisce, freddo ti impoverisce. (A hot May makes you rich; a cold one makes you poor.)

Words and Expressions

maggiolata –- May song

maggiolino -– May bug, beetle

maggiostrino -– May or straw hat archaic)

L’inverno a metà maggio riprende breve ingaggio –- Winter briefly takes up the fight again in mid-May

Dianne Hales is the author of LA BELLA LINGUA: My Love Affair with Italian, the World's Most Enchanting Language. Click here for more information on her "writer's studio" in Capri this fall. 

Celebrating May Festivals in Italy and the Italian Language

Le feste di maggio 

May festivals 

If you’re heading to Italy in the coming weeks, you can cheer the drivers in the famous Mille Miglia (1000 mile) car rally or celebrate Pinocchio’s birthday in Collodi (Tuscany). Here are some other not-to-be-missed festivities:

*Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, one of the oldest music festivals in Italy, features opera, concerts and dance. The outdoor performances at night often end with dazzling fireworks displays. While in Florence, be sure to go the city’s famous Iris Garden, open to the general public only in May. You’ll gain an entirely new appreciation for the root of Florence’s Italian name: Firenze, derived from the Latin for “to flower or blossom.”

*Giro d’Italia, the largest cycling event of the country, begins on May 5 and eventually climbs the famous Passo dello Stelvio to finish at the summit for the first time in the history of the event.

*Corsa dei Ceri (Race of the Candles). The stony, silent town of Gubbio in Umbria explodes into frenzied excitement every May 15. Three teams of men run up and down its steep streets carrying Ceri, gigantic wooden constructions, each weighing about a thousand pounds and bearing a statue of a saint on top. The Ceri and the Corsa dei Matti (Race of the Crazy Ones, as it's nicknamed) may date back to the twelfth century, when Gubbio was miraculously spared from the forces of Frederick Barbarossa. 

*Calendimaggio, a series of medieval and Renaissance spettacoli (shows) with concerts, dances, archery, flag-waving, cross-bow displays and torch-lit processions, held in Assisi in early May.

*La Barabbata, a procession in which men wear costumes and carry tools representing the traditional trades while white buffalo pull floats displaying the fruits of the trades, celebrated May 14 in Marta on the shores of Lake Bolsena.

*La Festa di San Domenico, a procession on the first Thursday in May in Cocullo in the Abruzzi, highlighted by the carrying of a statue of the town's patron saint covered with live serpents.

*Sposalizio dell’Albero, the wedding of the tree, on May 8 in Vetralla in northern Lazio, in which townspeople decorate a couple of oak trees with garlands and plant new trees in a ceremony that asserts the town's domination over the forest.

*Infiorata di Noto, a huge festival with flower petal art displays and a parade in Noto, Sicily, during the third weekend of May.

*Il Palio di Ferrara, a historical horse race dating from 1279, run the last Sunday in May, with events every weekend of the month, including a procession with over 1000 people in Renaissance costumes on the Saturday night before the race.

Words and Expressions

festeggiare -- to celebrate, welcome, entertain

festaiolo -- party animal, merry maker

festino -- banquet, party, feast

far festa a qualcuno -- to welcome or greet someone warmly

Dianne Hales,  author of LA BELLA LINGUA: MY LOVE AFFAIR WITH ITALIAN, THE WORLD'S MOST ENCHANTING LANGUAGE, invites you to join her for a magical week of writing, cooking, and adventures on beautiful Capri this fall. Click here for details.

 

Biking in Italy and the Italian Language

biking

andare in bicicletta

 by Susan Van Allen

Spring (la Primavera) is prime time for biking (andare in bicicletta) in Italy--mild temperatures (le temperature miti) and flowers (fiori) bursting into bloom are inspiration to get outside, immerse yourself in the heaping helping of beauty Mother Nature (Madre Natura) has bestowed on the Bel Paese, and get an endorphin rush while blending in with the great passion Italians have for biking. 


Here are five of my favorite biking places:

1: Borghese Gardens, Rome: Enjoy this elegant city oasis as the Romans do: Go to Bici Pincio (Viale di Villa Medici) to rent bikes (noleggiare bici) and then glide along sun dappled paths shaded by umbrella pines (pini), inhaling the smell of orange blossoms, amidst 65-acres of manicured green, highlighted with statuary, fountains, a pond, and Bioparco (zoo). 


2. Lucca, Tuscany: Going to Lucca and not biking around the town’s medieval wall is like going to Paris and not visiting the Eiffel Tower. The three-mile loop along the structure that once protected Lucca now makes for a sublime ride (easy and great for families), with stunning views of the historic center (centro storico) below and, in the distance, fields of wildflowers (distese di fiori di campo).


3. Sant’ Erasmo, Venice: This island (isola), nicknamed The Secret Garden of Venice (il giardino segreto di Venezia), lies between the well-known islands of Murano and Burano, about a 40-minute vaporetto ride (#14) from Venice. Delicious vegetables that you see at the Rialto market are grown here, such as artichokes that put forth gorgeous purple flowers in June. Rent bikes at Lato Azzurro B&B, pedal the 3.5 mile island loop, and join the locals for a refreshing swim at the quiet beach.

4. Ferrara, Emilia-Romagna: The historic center of this chic town, adorned with a mix of Renaissance and medieval architecture, is a “no car” zone (chiusa al traffico); 90 percent of the residents own bikes. Rent one at the train station and join in with senior citizens, mamme with their bambini in bike seats, and students, pedaling through the enchanting maze of cobblestoned lanes (viottoli), amidst the awe-inspiring D’Este castle and Romanesque-meets-Baroque duomo.

5. Puglia: Italy’s flattest region is my favorite (la mia preferita) for countryside biking. A springtime trip there with Backroads  sweeps me past groves (frutteti) of cherry trees heavy with deep red clusters of fruit, fields of crimson poppies (papaveri) and golden zucchini flowers, gentle rolling vineyards, beaches (spiagge) with views of the sparkling Adriatic, and the most gasp-inspiring: endless fields of olive trees (olivi) --the oldest in Italy, with humongous trunks the size of Volkswagens. Add to all that the sight of trulli, traditional conical shaped homes from medieval times, which bring a fairytale touch to your biking adventure.

I thank my friend Susan van Allen for this delightful post, which brings to mind an Italian saying: “Hai voluto la bicicletta? Adesso pedala!” (Didn’t you want the bycicle? Now keep pedaling!) It refers to someone who obtained some long-desired object or outcome and then confronts unexpected consequences--good, bad, overwhelming, or challenging . The best advice: Pedal!

Words and Expressions

bicicletta a due posti -- tandem bike

biciclettina -– child’s bike

ciclista –- cyclist

maglia rosa –- the pink jersey awarded to the winner of Giro d’Italia

pedalare -– to pedal

Susan van Allen is the author of 100 Places in Italy Every Woman Should Go and Letters from Italy: Confessions, Adventures and Advice.

Dianne Hales is the author of La Bella Lingua: My Love Affair with Italian, the World's Most Enchanting Language.

Celebrating Rome's Birth and Birthday in the Italian Language

Buon compleanno a Roma!

The eternal city is celebrating its 2,766th birthday on April 21.  If you’re in the city this weekend, you can enjoy the festivities -- special events at the Circus Maximus (once site of chariot races), concerts, gladiator displays, a parade, and  fireworks over the Tiber.

If I could be there, I’d head for the oldest part of Rome: the Palatine hill, named for the goddess Pales, patroness of shepherds—and the oldest part of Rome. In the eighth century B.C., the leader of a tribal settlement in central Italy ordered that the newborn sons of a disgraced Vestal Virgin be tossed into the Tiber. Their cradle, drifting downstream, washed ashore at the base of the Palatine hill.

According to legend, a lupa (she-wolf) suckled the twins Romulus and Remus. However, their nursemaid may well have been human. Lupa was slang for prostitute, and brothels were known as lupinaria. During ongoing excavations on the Palatine hill, archaeologists recently discovered what could be the original lupercale, the cave that sheltered the twins and that later served as a shrine for their worship.

In 753 B.C., after the boys had grown to maturity, they decided to build a new town on the banks of the Tiber. A violent argument erupted between them, and Romulus killed his brother Remus. Taking command, Romulus gave his name to the settlement that would grow into a great empire.

Over the centuries the Palatine hill, with its tranquil setting and splendid views, attracted rich and powerful residents. Octavius, later adopted by Julius Caesar, was born on this sacred site in 63 B.C. When the Senate proclaimed him Augustus, Rome's first emperor, he moved to a house near the small structure known as Romulus's hut. His successors, the emperors Tiberius, Caligula and Claudius, built much grander homes atop the Palatine. Visitors to these mansions called them palazzi—the root of the word for "palatial" residences in French (palais), Spanish (palla) and English (palace).

On ancient maps, three words indicated what lay beyond Rome’s hills: “Hic sunt Leones.” (Here are wild beasts.)   Rome changed everything, bringing civilization—laws, roads, urban planning, public works, even indoor plumbing--to an untamed world. But the glory of ancient Rome faded. What endures to this day is the Rome of the popolino (the little people).

Descendants of the empire’s tough-fighting, rough-talking legions, romani de Roma (those who lived in the city for seven generations) invented their own dialect anthem: “Lassatece passà, semo romani!” (Let us pass; we are Romans!) The imperious words were so often followed with a punch or a dagger thrust that a Roman wasn’t considered a Roman until he had “crossed the step”--the one at the door of the city’s oldest prison, Regina Coeli.

The imprint of the Roman empire remains on everything from coins to monuments, tombs, and temples. The manhole covers of Rome are still emblazoned with S.P.Q.R., the Latin abbreviaton for the Senatus Populusque Romanus, the senate and people of Rome. Italians joke that it really stands for "Sono pazzi questi romani." (These Romans are crazy.)

Words and Expressions

Roma non é stata fatta in un giorno –- Rome wasn’t built in a day

alla romana — to go Dutch or split the bill

romanico –- romance language

Paese che vai, usanza che trovi –- When in Rome, do as the Romans do. (Literally, the country that you go to, the customs that you find.)

Dianne Hales is the author of LA BELLA LINGUA: My Love Affair with Italian, the World's Most Enchanting Language.

Who can resist this classic ode to Rome?

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Happy Birthday Rome 2013

A Rainy Day in the Italian Language

la pioggia
the rain

"Piove" (It's raining), a friend in Italy complains. "Sempre piove." (It's always raining.) 

Although it's little consolation, I remind her that Italian pioggia falls in many varieties.  Some days bring a soft drizzle (pioggerella); others, a heavy shower (acquazzone) or even an intense squall (piovasco). And there can be something special about being sotto la pioggia (in the rain) in Italy.

“Piove da morire (it’s raining to death),”  a clerk in Rome said when I sought shelter from a downpour (piovere a dirotto) in her shop. Puddles (pozzanghere) of acqua piovana (rain water) formed instantly. The shutters creaked in the wind. Lightning (fulmini) sparked in the distance, and thunder (tuoni) roared overhead.

I wished that I had remembered a giacca impermeabile (waterproof jacket) and maybe even some stivali di gomma (rubber boots).  Vendors immediately materialized on the street, selling just what I needed: an ombrello (umbrella, from ombra for shadow). I dashed through the rain drops (gocce di pioggia) to my apartment.

Snug and warm, listening to the rumore della pioggia (sound of the rain) on the roof, I contemplated less literal meanings of Italian’s “rain” words:  “Non ci piove,” for instance, translates as “without doubt"; "a pioggia," as "indiscriminately."

Someone who “fa la pioggia e il bel tempo” (makes the rain and the fair weather) calls all the shots.  If this sort of bigwig makes an irrevocable decision, “non ci piove nè ci nevica” (it  neither rains nor snows on it).

English-speakers may react to a cascade of troubles by saying, "When it rains, it pours."  Italians have a somewhat similar expressions: “Piove sempre sul bagnato.” (It always rains on the wet.) However, they say this  when fortunate people get yet another lucky break as well as when things go wrong yet again for unfortunate ones. 

One saying about un giorno piovoso (a rainy day) proved true the very next day: Dopo la pioggia viene il bel tempo. After the rain comes fine weather. 

Words and Expressions

piovoso –- rainy, threatening to rain

piovuta -– rainfall

piovigginoso –- drizzling

Il diluvio universale –- Noah’s flood

un pioggia di insulti  –- a rain of insults

Cielo a pecorelle, pioggia a catinelle! -- a sky (cielo) with clouds like little sheep (pecorelle) portends rain by the bucketfuls (catinelle)

Dianne Hales is the author of LA BELLA LINGUA: My Love Affair with Italian, the World's Most Enchanting Language. 

Click below for a song to listen to until the skies clear: