Italian language

Italian Dictionary

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Italian words and their definitions are scattered throughout this site, but up til now there has been no easy way to find them all. This page will begin to fix that. Click on a link to visit the page where a word or phrase is explained in more detail. Note: I am by no means a professional lexicalist (or whatever they’re called), so cannot claim 100% accuracy.

This site also includes a large and growing section devoted to Italian slang and swearwords. That’s already in alphabetical order, so those words are not reproduced here.

Work in progress!

A

apertura

asporto [ahs-POR-to] Take-away, as in food.

B

balena whale

bene well

bifolco [bee-FOAL-ko] peasant, yokel

bocca mouth

bocciare [BOTCH-char-re] to flunk (transitive)

bocciato/a [botch-CHA-to] flunked, rejected

botte barrel or cask

bucaneve [boo-ka-NAY-vay] crocus

buono good

C

cadere (past tense: caduto) to fall

cappello hat or cap

casino [cah-ZEEN-o] A mess.

chiasso [KYAS-soh] noise

comune [co-MOO-nay] municipality or municipal government

coperta [co-PAIR-ta] cover charge

D

demografico demographic, population

disagio [dizz-AHJ-oh] discomfort, inconvenience

G

gola, fare gola, goloso, golosita‘ All words to do with appetite or gluttony.

guai [GWHY] troubles

Guardia di Finanza [GWAR-dee-ah dee fin-AHN-za] The police force who investigate tax evasion and other financial crimes.

L

lupo wolf

M

maccheronico [mah-care-ON-ik-o] “Macaroni-like”, i.e. heavily Italianized

manovratori [ma-no-vra-TOR-ee] maneuverers – (I think) the guys who shunt trains around in railyards

messinscena [mess-in-SHAY-na] an act meant to deceive

mettere to put

modestamente modestly

moglie wife

mortalità scolastica [mor-tal-i-TAH sco-LAS-ti-ca] school failure rate

N

notte night

nuvola cloud

O

occasione Occasion, but also a good deal.

orto vegetable garden

P

paese [pah-AY-zay] nation or hometown

pane bread

panetteria [pahn-net-tear-REE-a] bread bakery

peccato [PECK-kah-toe] Sin or shame.

piacere [pya-CHAIR-ay] to please, to be liked

piccolo small

pieno [PYAY-no] full. Can also be used as a noun at the gas station: Mi fa il pieno – “Fill ‘er up.”

popolo [POP-oh-lo] A people or the people, e.g. Piazza del Popolo – Plaza of the People

prossima next

R

rete [RAY-tay] a net or network, but la rete (THE network) refers specifically to the Internet

rosticceria [rohs-stitch-chair-REE-a] “roasting place” – A shop/restaurant selling hot foot to take away (though they may also have a few tables for you to eat there).

S

scontata discounted, taken for granted

sdrucciolo [ZDRU-cho-lo] adj., slippery. Also used in grammar to refer to words stressed not on the usual (for Italian) penultimate syllable but on the third from last – the word sdrucciolo itself is an example!

secchio bucket

secchione A swot, someone who studies a lot.

sensibilizzazione [sen-si-bil-IDZ-zazz-yo-nay] to make someone sensitive to or aware of something

serva [SAIR-vuh] maidservant (somewhat archaic, no one has a maidservant nowadays)

servizi services

sfumature shades of meaning

smarrire [zmah-REER-ay] to lose

supportare to support, put up with

T

tapparelle [tahp-pah-RELL-ay] roll-up window blinds

ti amo “I love you,” in cases of passionate, romantic love.

ti voglio bene Literally “I wish you well,” but means “I love you” among friends.

U

ubriaco drunk

V

vicolo [VEE-co-low] alley

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Out With the Old, In With the New

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The first time I visited Milan was in early January, 1991 – it must have been right after the New Year. We arrived in the city late at night and had to walk some way to find our hotel.

As we went, I asked Enrico if Milan’s garbage collectors were on strike or something. I was startled by the amount and nature of the garbage on the sidewalks: old appliances and furniture, heaps of trash, broken dishes and glassware, all scattered untidily around as if everyone had suddenly heaved all their old junk out the windows at the same time.

Which was exactly what they had done. Enrico explained to me that it was an Italian custom at the new year to replace old, worn out housewares. Traditionally you threw the the old stuff out the window at midnight on New Year’s, to signify your readiness to welcome the new year into your home.

This was never as popular in northern Italy as in the south, and I’ve hardly noticed it in Milan since that year, but they tell me that in Napoli the custom is still going strong: you don’t want to be walking under anyone’s windows at midnight. But then, you don’t want to be much of anywhere in Napoli on New Year’s: every New Year’s Day the media trot out the statistics on the night’s deaths and injuries due to over-enthusiastic use of fireworks and even firearms. Everyone wants to make a big bang to welcome in the new year, and often they’re too careless (or drunk) to see where they’re aiming. Italy’s north-south prejudices aside, there do seem to be more fatalities in Napoli than anywhere else in the country. Too many guns in circulation.

As for house junk: I tend to get rid of it throughout the year. Even with plenty of space in our new home, I feel oppressed by too many possessions, and give short shrift to the idea that “we might as well keep it around, we might want it someday.”

This year we actually have some housewares to get rid of: the old, scratched, survivors of a set of drinking glasses I bought years ago at an outlet store in downtown Milan. They were so beautiful back then: slightly pear-shaped with heavy bottoms, delicately tinted in six different colors, and two sizes, tall and short.

After we moved to Lecco and had, for the first time in our lives, a dishwasher, I was suddenly dismayed to realize that they had lost all their color: “not dishwasher safe” was a new concept to me. Ah, well. Reflect upon the evanescence of material objects, and heave them out the window.

NB: Don’t forget your red underwear!

What are your New Year’s customs?

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Lake Como Travel Tips

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^ above: View from the central western shore, above and north of Menaggio. Want to enjoy this view during your Italian vacation? You can rent the place where I took this photo

Lake Como, shaped like an upside-down Y, is easily reached from Milan by car or train. You can take the train to Lecco (on the eastern tip of the Y), Como (on the western tip), or Varenna (on the east side of the center of the lake, opposite Bellagio in the crotch of the Y). From any of these places you can take commuter boats all over the lake. Go here for video of the ferry ride.

FAQ: How to Reach Varenna from Malpensa Airport

  • The Cheap Way: Airport bus to Milan Central Station (1 hour, depending on traffic, about 6 euros), then direct train to Varenna (about every hour, also around 6 euros)
  • The Easy Way: hire a car, from e.g. Best Viaggi. Antonello is absolutely reliable, and speaks very good English.

Some places to visit on and near Lake Como:

My videos of Lake Como:

Got any great tips or sites for visits to Lake Como? Please share!

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How Now John Chow?

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A Useful Site If You’re Looking to Monetize

I’ve mentioned him in passing, but I’ll be more explicit now: if you are interested in making money from your website/blog, John Chow is full of good advice. Though already a “Dot Com Mogul”, he started a new blog about a year ago which focuses mostly on how to do this, e.g. by being a “Google whore“, with some interesting asides about his multicultural life as a Chinese-Canadian, which of course I enjoy and empathize with.

Although I’ve been using Google AdSense for a while, I haven’t written much about it, partly because their terms of use seem to prohibit explicit discussion of how much money one is making – without which, it’s hard say anything useful and concrete about how to make more.

Either Google have changed their rules about discussing money, or John doesn’t mind risking risking a rap on the knuckles – he’s very up-front about how much he’s earning. (Not that he’s likely to get any guff from Google – apparently he’s one of their favorite people.)

And he doesn’t mind pushing the Google envelope with advice about dodgy practices such as making ads appear to be part of your text or placing images so that they appear to be part of, and draw attention to, Google ads. His experiments are especially useful because somebody at Google reads his blog, and soon follows up with clarification on what exactly their rules mean.

That sort of thing tells me what I can’t do, but fortunately John is also helpful on what I can do to increase revenues. The recent addition of advertising to my comments section is thanks to his tip about an AdSense plugin for WordPress (the blogging software I use for comments), which has even made me a few cents already.

One discouraging thing I’ve learned is that I make about a tenth of John’s income from AdSense, and I get about a tenth of his traffic. So, to meet my goal of earning a “salary” from my site, it seems that I will have to get ten times the traffic I currently get. Which can be done – and John, among many others, offers suggestions on how – but it will take time. <sigh>

All this focus on making money could be distasteful, especially knowing that my visits contribute to John’s enviable (and by me envied) success. But he gives his site earnings to charity and, now, to a trust fund for his baby daughter. And who can quarrel with that? I have a daughter of my own, and part of my motivation for wanting to make money from my site is that she wants to go away to school next year!

And he doesn’t mind sharing the wealth with us aspiring Google whores. John recently offered to post links to any and all sites that review his, including this one. Because his site is so popular, this kind of link has intrinsic value (as I’ll be discussing in a future piece in my own making money on your site series).

What with the Christmas rush, I didn’t get this review done in time to participate in the contest for a MiniTV USB device (which might not have worked in Europe anyway, and I already tried one out from the office, and when am I going to watch Italian TV on my laptop?). But here it is, with thanks to John for all the good advice he has already shared, and the more good advice I expect he’ll continue to share.

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