Dianne Hales - La Bella Lingua

The blog has moved!

dianne@diannehales.com (Dianne Hales) — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 01:26:00 +0000

Please check out my new blog here, or click the graphic below!

Grazie, Dianne

bello

dianne@diannehales.com (Dianne) — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 02:21:00 +0000

bello
beautiful, lovely, wonderful

“Wow!” “Cool!” “Fantastic!” “Terrific!” “Fabulous!” We couldn’t say enough to praise the magnificent fireworks exploding over Porto Ercole in celebration of its patron Saint Erasmo. I turned to one of our guests, a young Umbrian winemaker, and asked what he thought. He replied with a single word, “Bello!”, and I realized that in these two simple syllables, he had said it all.

Italian, la bella lingua, has no greater—or more ubiquitous—compliment. A nice thing is qualcosa di bello. Italy itself long ago earned the nickname il bel paese (the beautiful country). Beautiful singing—bel canto—took flight here. Italy’s designers clothe il bel mondo, the fashionable world. Its citizens have perfected the standard of courtesy and style known as bella figura, which applies even to life’s end. “Fare una bella morte” means to die a noble or good death.

All of which was just too bello for the British writer Aldous Huxley, who complained, “From a cornice by Michelangelo to a belpaese cheese or the most horrible dribbling baby, everything is beautiful.” But as I’ve listened to Italians, I’ve realized that not every “bello” is una bella parola (a kind word).

An out-and-out scoundrel, for example, is un mascalzone bell’e buono who might tell tales “delle belle”—real beauts or whoppers, we’d say in English—or try to farsi bello con le penne del pavone (make himself beautiful with the peacock’s feathers—with borrowed finery, that is).

Yet Italian reverence for beauty (la bellezza) is genuine and runs deep. When I complimented a hostess on her exquisitely decorated dinner table, she taught me an Italian proverb: Anche l’occhio vuole la sua parte. The eye also wants its due. Italians grow up knowing that it is as important to feed the hungry eye as the hungry stomach.

One day I was watching toddlers romp among the sculptures and fountains of Florence’s Boboli Gardens. “Do they even see the beauty all around them?” I asked my companion. “Certo,” she replied, “Sentono la bellezza.” The verb she chose—the third-person plural of sentire—goes beyond “seeing” to encompass all the senses. These fortunate children, I realized, were breathing in beauty like air. And what could be more bello than that?

Sayings and Expressions:

il bello della vita – the beauty of life

fare la bella vita – to live the high life

Questo è sole per bellezza – this is only for decoration

“Non è bello quel che è bello, è bello quel che piace”—it’s not that which is beautiful that is beautiful; what’s beautiful is what pleases one”; in other words, beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

furbo

dianne@diannehales.com (Dianne) — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 22:54:00 +0000

furbo
cunning or crafty person

Only after years of visiting Italy did I realize that Italians admire rather than disdain a furbo, someone who can pull off a clever deception. “Che furbetto!” a young mother exclaimed rather proudly when her son shifted the blame for a childish prank to his little brother.

An impressed friend recounted how a shrewd furbacchione had obtained a coveted building permit for a rectangular, cement-lined hole in his backyard by describing it, not as a swimming pool (prohibited by law), but as a storage vat for water that local firefighters might need to douse a blaze. A more deceitful furbastro would somehow manage to make money in the process, while a wheeler-dealer furbone would go after big profits by negotiating permits for an entire village.

The furbo holds a prominent place in Italian history. Although best known as a seducer, Giovani Giacomo Casanova (1725-1798) swindled his way to (and through) several fortunes. The self-declared Count of Cagliostro (1743-1795), a Sicilian street urchin, conned gullible souls across Europe with magical elixirs for youth and potency, mystical spells and skillful forgeries.

The Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini (1883-1945) hoodwinked Hitler himself. When the Fuhrer visited Rome in May, 1938, Il Duce proudly displayed a prosperous imperial city. But its walls of gleaming travertine marble were nothing more than painted stage sets. The poet Trilussa wrote a famous epigram in Roman dialect on the occasion:

“Roma de travertino, / rifatta de cartone, / saluta l’imbianchino, / suo prossimo padrone.”
(“Rome of travertine, re-made with cardboard, greets the house pointer who will be her next master”)

My husband, transformed from Bob to Roberto in Italy, cannot resist a linguistic version of furbizia by casually dropping well-rehearsed Italian witticisms into conversations as if he were fluent. Italian acquaintances invariably applaud Professor Roberto for his cleverness.

However, some furbizia also lurks in my soul. The very first aphorism I taught Bob—and encouraged him to say on every occasion—was, Mia moglie ha sempre ragione. My wife is always right.

Sayings and Expressions:

Non fare il furbo—don’t try to be clever.

Per conoscere un furbo, ci vuole un furbo e mezzo – to know a trickster, it takes a trickster and a half (roughly, it takes one to know one)

An Italian friend recalls a childhood rhyme her friends would recite while rhythmically bouncing a ball against a wall:

Calzolaio Furbacchione (The shrewed shoemaker)
Fa le scarpe di cartone (makes shoes out of cardboard)
La signora non ci bada (the lady doesn’t notice)
Perde il tacco a meta’ strada (she loses the heel along the way).

Spazzatura

dianne@diannehales.com (Dianne) — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 15:27:00 +0000

spazzatura
sweepings, trash, refuse

At one of my first formal Italian classes, I entered the room with an empty paper coffee cup in hand.

“Spazzatura?” the amiable young teacher asked.

“Sì,” I responded, certain that I wanted whatever this spray of sibilant syllables offered. Then I tracked her outstretched arm as she pointed to the waste basket in the corner.

“Trash,” she said in English.

“Such a lovely word for such an ugly thing!” I exclaimed.

“Bella, sì,” she replied. “Anche molto vecchia.” (Also very old.)

How old? Like many of the words in Italian’s linguistic base---its 10,000 most-used words—spazzare (to sweep) dates back to the fourteenth century, when it appeared in the writings of Italian’s first great narrative stylist, Giovanni Boccaccio (1313-1375). With such a literary pedigree, it's not surprising that trash sounds beautiful in Italian—especially when you’re sweeping it with a rustic handmade twig broom like this one I photographed at a Tuscan villa.

Over the centuries spazzatura sprouted offshoots such as spazzatina, (dusting), spazzola (brush) and spazzolaio (brushmaker). More recent derivatives include spazzamine (mine-sweeper), spazzaneve (snow plough) and my favorite, spazzolino da denti, a toothbrush. But although the word remains the same, spazzatura has taken on forms unimaginable seven centuries ago.

Months ago, when Naples ran out of places to dump or incinerate its garbage, trash piled up in huge, stinking mounds. On the Italian television news, alarmed citizens protested. Health officials sounded warnings. Politicians ranted in outrage. I couldn’t understand much of what the native Neapolitans were saying in their lilting dialect, but one familiar word echoed through every news report: spazzatura.

This medieval word actually inspired a catchy contemporary song, “La Spazzatura,” by Marco Saltatempo. Could lyrics like “Throw out the trash, the trash stinks” (“Butta la spazzatura, puzza la spazzatura”) sound so appealing in any other language?

Sayings and Expressions

“Amore mio, puoi portare fuori la spazzatura?” -- “My love, can you take out the garbage?” (one of the most useful questions I ever learned from a language website)
TV spazzatura – trash TV (used to describe gross reality shows and similar programs)
spazzacamino – chimney sweep
spazzavento – a windswept spot
spazzola da panni – clothes brush
spazzolarsi capelli – to brush one’s hair

Buongiorno! Buonasera! Buonanotte!

dianne@diannehales.com (Dianne Hales) — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 07:07:00 +0000

Buongiorno! Buonasera! Buonanotte!

Good day! Good evening! Good night!

Time takes different names in Italian. If you want to know the time of day, you ask, “Che ore sono?” (Literally, what are the hours?) If you worry "all the time," you use “il tempo” as in “tutto il tempo.” (Il tempo also means weather so some people may be worrying about il tempo tutto il tempo.) If you do something one time, you say “una volta”; twice, “due volte”, if you do it all at once, it’s “tutto in una volta.” These points of distinction I accept. After all, Italian’s roots date back almost 3,000 years, far too much time for any single word to transmit.

Yet after dozens of trips to Italy, one question continued to confound me: at what hour of the day do you stop saying “buongiorno” (good day) and start using “buonasera” (good evening) or “buonanotte” (good night). In Florence, if I uttered “buongiorno” a minute after noon, people would often respond with “buonasera.” In Rome I kept hearing “buongiorno” well into the afternoon.

I ventured an occasional “buon pomeriggio!” (good afternoon!) but rarely heard an Italian use this greeting. I discovered why in a scholarly linguistic analysis of modern Italian.* Long divided into separate (and often warring) city-states, Italy evolved as a mosaic of regional dialects, each with distinctive sounds, structures and vocabulary. In some places, including Tuscany, the birthplace of Italian, citizens progressed through centuries of days without a pomeriggio (or any other word for afternoon). La mattina (morning) simply blended into la sera (evening) at some unspecified point after midday.

For further clarification I turned to a highly qualified authority: Valeria della Valle, a professor of Italian at Rome’s La Sapienza University and author of both scholarly texts and popular best-sellers on the language. La Professoressa offers this rule of thumb: il buongiorno until lunchtime (likely to be later in Rome than northern cities), la buonasera afterward.

As for buonanotte, save it for your final farewell before heading to bed. And if you want to ensure sogni d’oro (golden dreams), listen to “Buonanotte, buonanotte,” a contemporary ninna nanna (lullaby) sung by the Italian pop legend Mina.

Sayings and Expressions:

Il buon giorno si vede dal mattino -- You can tell by the morning if it’s going to be a good day.

Buonanotte al secchio! -- Literally good night to the bucket, an idiomatic way of dismissing a topic

Buonasera! -- If injected into the middle of a conversation, “good evening” serves as an ironic way of signaling the end of a task or discussion—or of the impossibility of ever sorting out a thorny problem.

*Tosi, Arturo. Language and Society in a Changing Italy. Clevedon, England: Multilingual Matters, 2001, p. 44.

Buon compleanno!

dianne@diannehales.com (Dianne Hales) — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 16:47:00 +0000

Buon compleanno!

Happy Birthday!

Today is my birthday, but this year I’m taking (or at least trying to take) a new perspective on the ever-advancing years. Rather than fretting in English about the time elapsed since my date of birth, I’m switching to the wonderful Italian notion of “compleanno.” Its root verb compiere dates back to the thirteenth-century poets who were the first to write in the Tuscan vernacular rather than in classical Latin. While compiere can translate as “complete,” it also can mean “fulfill.” And so I am joyously celebrating the fulfillment of my years.

Perhaps because the language itself is so old, Italian displays a kinder, gentler attitude toward aging. An Italian will never bluntly demand, “How old are you?” This question translates into “Quanti anni hai?” “How many years do you have?” Ever so subtly the phrasing implies that the higher the number, the bigger the bouquet. Perhaps that’s why Italians typically think of themselves as the age they will be on their next birthday.

A young Italian, eager for grown-up status, will say, “Sto per compiere quindici anni” (I’m about to turn 15—literally to complete fifteen years). Older Italians refer to themselves as being in “the class of,” say, 1948 or 1955. I thought they were referring to a graduation year until a friend explained that “class” refers to year of birth, not schooling.

To mark the completion of another year, birthday celebrants in Italy share their happiness by giving treats to others rather than receiving consolation prizes for time served. In return, family and friends toast them with auguri or best wishes. “Cent’anni!” (A hundred years!) wrote a friend in my first e-mail of the day. “Cento di questi giorni!” (A hundred of these days!) wrote another. I extend the same good wishes to all of you.

Sayings and Expressions

“Oggi compio gli anni” – Today’s my birthday. (Literally, today I fulfill my years.)

Essere avanti con gli anni – to be getting on in years

"Tanti auguri a te" -- the equivalent of the English "Happy Birthday to You" song, sung to the same melody

cafone

dianne@diannehales.com (Dianne Hales) — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 14:00:00 +0000

cafone
peasant, bumpkin, hick

Every country has its share of jerks, clods and ignorant slobs, but Italian reserves the word “cafone” (pronounced cah-fon-ay) for its home-grown variety. This utterly Italian insult traces its history back to Cafo or Cafonis, a centurion of Mark Anthony, mentioned several times by Cicero. Its linguistic pedigree includes a debut in Italian literature in 1861, the year of the nation’s unification, in a publication called La perseveranza (Perseverance).

Cafone can apply to any generic dork, but Italian offers distinctions for the son of an ignorant bumpkin (figlio d’un cafone), a crude slob (cafone rozzo), a tasteless boob (cafone sciocco), an ill-mannered fool (cafone maleducato), an officious ass (cafone impertinente), a tasteless jerk (cafone senza gusto), and a disgusting boor (cafone ripugnante).

The most recent Galateo (Italian etiquette book) includes a “dizionario delle cafonate,” an alphabetical listing of boorish behaviors that include throwing chewing gum on the ground per la gioia delle suole altrui (for the joy of others’ soles); sticking a finger into un pertugio del corpo (a body opening), grattarsi ostentatamente (scratching oneself ostentatiously) and using fingernails as stuzzicadenti (toothpicks).

I have used cafone exactly once—at a free concert celebrating April 21, Rome’s official birthday, at the city’s opera house. The mainly elderly Romans, dressed smartly (as their generation always does), were already seated when a pudgy foreigner in shorts and a tee shirt squeezed into our row to take the empty seat next to mine.

“Please don’t let him be American,” I prayed, but as soon as I heard his string of “Excuse me’s,” I knew he was. Just as he sat down, he erupted into a volcanic sneeze. Obviously lacking a handkerchief, he blotted his nose with the back of one hand and then wiped it dry on his hairy thigh. The appalled woman on my other side and I locked eyes and almost simultaneously mouthed the same words, “Che cafone!”

Cafone also can refer to something molto buono (very good): pane cafone, the simple daily bread of Naples and the surrounding region. You don’t need Italian to follow this basic recipe. Just watch Mr. Bread at work:

Sayings and Expressions:

If you encounter a cafone:
Ma Lei, cafone ci è nato o ci è diventato? -- Were you born rude or did you become rude?

Synonyms (useful if you ever find yourself trading insults with a cafone): rozzo, villano, zotico, buzzurro, maleducato

albergo

dianne@diannehales.com (Dianne Hales) — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 23:07:00 +0000

albergo

hotel

As we were tooling around Lago Maggiore many years ago, my husband asked me, “Who is this guy Albergo and why is his name on so many buildings?” I gently explained that “albergo” means hotel.

Derived from the Germanic haribergo for a military barracks, albergo dates back to the Dark Ages, when barbarian hordes swept over the Italian peninsula. The Romans, who described their orderly style of warfare as bellum, couldn’t withstand the disorderly tactics of the Germans, whose werra (war) became the Italian guerra and the root of the English “guerilla.”

Other Teutonic imports to the Italian language include scherzare (to joke), ricco (rich) and russare (to snore). Some words reflect the miseries the barbarians inflicted-- gramo for wretched, scherno for scorn, smacco for shame. Others reveal contempt for the occupying forces. Italian uses zanna, from the German for tooth, only for an animal’s fang or tusk and stalla, German for house, for a horse stall or a pigsty.

Over the centuries Italian evolved as a sort of linguistic hotel, accommodating guests from many languages. The Spaniards, who presided over the Kingdom of Naples, contributed courtly words such as complimento (compliment), baciamano (handkiss) and parata (parade). French added stylish touches such as moda (fashion) and cravatta (tie) and changed the meaning of parrucca, which had meant one’s natural hair in Italian, to wig (a "big wig" is a parruccone). A friend taught me a Russian import when she accused me of being a stachanovista (workaholic), from Stachanov, a Russian miner who introduced new techniques to increase productivity.

Today foreign words make up an estimated 10 percent of the Italian vocabulary. In the linguistic albergo italiano, English occupies the presidential suite. Several thousand terms have settled into mainstream Italian, including computer, software, best-seller, killer, manager, cowboy, popcorn, massmedia (one word), playboy, coffee break, stress, babysitter, flirt and weekend.

Some English words have simply acquired Italian endings: chat became chattare; blog, bloggare; and skype, skypare. However, others have taken on a uniquely Italian spin. In Italian a “golf” refers to a pullover; a “mister,” to a coach of a soccer team; a “smoking,” to a tuxedo; a “spot,” to a commercial; and a “fiction,” to a film for TV. From American politics Italian journalists took “ticket” for a party’s presidential and vice-presidential candidates and created “tricket” for three contenders in an election.

Sayings and Expressions

albergo per famiglie – residential hotel
alberghi per la gioventù – youth hostels (ostelli della gioventù)
albergo a ore – cheap motel (literally a hotel by the hours) where lovers rent rooms for a tryst
albergo a gestione familiare – a family-run hotel, a bed-and-breakfast
“Questa casa non è un albergo!” – “This house is not a hotel!” a common complaint of mother whose children are constantly coming and going

goloso

dianne@diannehales.com (Dianne Hales) — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 15:56:00 +0000

goloso
crazy about a food

Dictionaries translate goloso as gluttonous. I disagree. Yes, it stems from the same word--gola (throat)—as in peccato di gola (sin of the throat, which may be my favorite kind). But like swine, gluttons snarf up everything edible. A goloso may be a buongustaio (food lover), a buona forchetta (hearty eater) or a ghiottone (gourmet) but also craves a particular type of food, such as cioccolata, nutella, supplì (Roman rice and cheese balls) or (in my case) fiori di zucca (fried zucchini flowers).

The Italian lust for food dates back to ancient Rome, where citizens savored exotic delicacies such as flamingo tongues, roasted swan, cherries from Asia, pistachio nuts from Syria and dates from Egypt. According to culinary lore, Nero was a goloso for flavored snow from nearby mountains—the original gelato.

The love of both food and language played a pivotal role in the creation of Italian as we know it. In the late Renaissance a group of irreverent young Florentine intellectuals set out to separate the literary equivalent of wheat from chaff. The members of L’Accademia della Crusca (the Academy of Bran) playfully gave themselves names related to cooking and baking, such as Lievito (yeast or leaven), Macinato (milled into flour) and Grattugiato (grated). Working diligently for decades, they produced Il Vocabolario della Crusca, the first great dictionary of officially recognized words in Italian—or in any European tongue.

Every year the Crusconi would gather for an annual stravizzo, a term they defined with understatement as “eating that happens together with pleasant conversation.” The menu from one stravizzo (its modern form stravizio denotes debauchery or excess) presents five staggering courses that included veal, tongue, prosciutto, pigeon, chicken, capon, lamb, meat rolls, soup, several varieties of pasta, artichokes, Parmigiano, strawberries, pears, peaches, biscotti—and stuzzicadenti (toothpicks).

By the end of such an eating orgy, each of the word-lovers was pieno come un uovo (full as an egg). Sooner or later many a goloso ends up that way.

Sayings and Expressions:

buongustaio -- food lover
buona forchetta -- hearty eater
ghiottone – gourmet
pieno come un uovo – stuffed (literally full as an egg)
prendere qualcuno per la gola -- get to someone through his love for food
(literally to take someone by the throat)

piacere

dianne@diannehales.com (Dianne Hales) — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 20:21:00 +0000

piacere

noun: pleasure, favor
verb: to please, to be pleasing

“Piacere,” Italians say when introduced, and the very sound evokes a tantalizing sense of delights to come. As he pronounces each syllable, an Italian man may clasp a woman’s fingers and pull them close to (but not touching) his lips. This chivalrous gesture, however quaint, never fails to charm me.

As a literary term, piacere dates back to the Middle Ages and the “sweet new style” (dolce stil nuovo) of the first poets –Dante foremost among them—who wrote in vernacular Italian rather than traditional Latin. Italians still take time and make space for pleasure in their daily lives. And they know well both what is to their liking and how to ask for it.

English-speakers declare “I like it” when they see, hear, or taste something that elicits their approval. Rather than such a blunt opinion, Italians register appreciation indirectly with the phrase “mi piace” (it is pleasing to me), words that capture the seductive, subjective nature of pleasure.

I learned the importance of choosing the right phrase to ask for a preferred pleasure years ago from a Venetian gentleman who chided me for using the word voglio (I want) in a simple request. “Voglio is for babies, shaking their hands and crying,” he said.

Vorrei—the conditional form, “I would want” or “I’d like”—functions well when buying a train ticket or ordering lunch. However, grander requests—a balcony seat overlooking the altar at Easter Mass in St. Peter’s Square, for instance, or a sunset spin around the isle of Ponza (in the photo above)—require language of a higher level.

“To get what you want, you must ask like a principessa,” my self-appointed Venetian tutor insisted. And so he taught me the elegant conditional form mi piacerebbe. (It would be pleasing to me). In Italy these gracious words conjure up a magic more potent than “Open Sesame!” Whenever I unfurl them as a preface to what I would like, no one ever says no.

Expressions and Sayings

a piacere -- as much as one likes
per piacere! -- please!
piacere [di conoscerla]! -- pleased to meet you!
con piacere -- with pleasure
fare un piacere a qualcuno -- do somebody a favor
mi farebbe piacere – I’d be pleased to (literally it would give me pleasure)

dianne@diannehales.com (Dianne Hales) — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 03:29:00 +0000

tu, Lei, voi

you (informal), you (formal), you (plural)

You are always “you” in English, regardless of age, gender, rank, or number. In Italian you might be tu (informal), Lei (formal) or voi (plural). If you happen to be royalty or a pontiff, you might even be called Loro (which generally means they or their). Other languages also distinguish between formal and informal terms of address, but only in Italian can the choice of a second-person designation spell the difference between bella and brutta figura.

If this seems confusing, don’t blame the ancient Romans. They used tu a tutti, the casual “you” to everyone, from slave to emperor. In the Middle Ages, their Italian descendents, wanting to accord special respect to worthier persons, began using the plural “voi,” for someone as valuable as two lesser “tu’s.” Until the twentieth century Italian youngsters said voi out of respect when talking to their parents and grandparents. Many southern Italian dialects that date back to medieval times still use voi as a polite form of address.

Sometime in the 1500s, probably in the resplendent courts of the day, voi gave way to Lei, the word for “she.” Contrary to a common assumption among Italians, Lei did not derive from the Spanish (usted serves as its formal you) but stands for Sua eccellenza” (Your Excellency), a feminine noun. Italians addressed every stranger or superior, male or female, as if he or she were a principessa.

The fascist dicatator Benito Mussolini, seeking a more virile language for his macho vision of the Italian nation, substituted the comradely voi, the plural “you all,” for Lei. Under his rule, voi was obligatory in schools, public offices, movies, radio and public ceremonies. Italians quickly returned to the traditional Lei when their hated dictator fell from power. For years after World War II, il voi for just one person persisted only in the mouths of American movie stars. Thanks to professional Italian dubbers, on screen Cary Grant, Audrey Hepburn, Jimmy Stewart and Grace Kelly always addressed their costars as if they were Fascist loyalists.

When I first started studying Italian, I decided to dodge the formal-familiar dilemma entirely by learning only the polite “Lei” form of address. I honestly figured I wouldn’t get to know anyone well enough to need “il tu.” (This happily turned out not to be the case.)

One day when I was jogging on a country road in Tuscany, an agitated man explained that his dog was trapped in a steep ravine. He could push him from behind, but would I call the dog to come to me? He, of course, addressed me in the respectful “Lei” form. And I, knowing no other, did the same with the dog. The man nearly fell over laughing at the sound of my oh-so-polite imprecations, which translated as, “Mister Dog, would you please be so kind as to come to me?”

Sayings and Expressions

Diamoci del tu!: Let’s give each other “il tu.”
La ringrazio: I thank you (formal)
Ti ringrazio: I thank you (informal)
Vi ringrazio: I thank all of you.

Ciao!

dianne@diannehales.com (Dianne) — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 19:56:00 +0000

ciao

(chaow)

hello, goodbye

The cheery Italian ciao, which does double duty as “hi” and “bye,” dates back to the glittering heyday of the Venetian Republic. I learned its history on my first visit to La Serenissima (Italians’ nickname for the watery city) from a waiter at the café where I would sip espresso and watch the pigeons swoop across the Piazza di San Marco.

Ciao, he explained, was a local invention. Centuries ago Venice’s courtly correspondents signed letters, “Il Suo schiavo” (your slave). Meeting on the street, acquaintances would bow and repeat these ingratiating words. However, in the Venetian dialect, which softens the hard sound of sch (pronounced sk in other regions) to a chewy sh (as in show), Suo schiavo came out s’ciao or sciao, which melted into ciao as it migrated to other parts of Italy.

Despite its origin as a formal salutation, ciao has evolved into a casual greeting. Various teachers have instructed me to use ciao only with those I know by first name (and to include their names in the greeting, as in “Ciao, Luigi!”), with children or in informal settings like dances and tours.

Italian men of every age in any piazza cry out “Ciao, bella!” (Hi, beautiful!) to compliment passing lovelies. (None would stoop to a cheesy “Ciao, baby!”) Telephone conversations with my Italian friends end with a stream of ciao’s—not just the equivalent of bye-bye, but a rapid-fire ciao-ciao-ciao-ciao-ciao until one of us surrenders and hangs up.

When hundreds of thousands of Italians emigrated from their impoverished homeland in the late 1800s and early 1900s, they often lined the railings of the departing ships. Straining for a last glimpse of Italy, they stared at its coastline until it blurred into the horizon. One by one Italians bound for North or South America would whisper a final “ciao” to the country many never saw again.

During World War II, i partigiani, Italy’s underground fighters against Nazi Germany, a former ally, set new words to a workers’ folk song. “Bella, Ciao!” became the unofficial anthem of the resistance. Its lyrics tell of a young man who goes to fight with the partisans. If he dies, all he asks is be buried on the mountain, where a beautiful flower will bloom in memory of the partisan who died for freedom. Its chorus--“O bella, ciao! bella, ciao! bella, ciao, ciao, ciao!” (“Oh beautiful, goodbye. Beautiful, goodbye! Beautiful, goodbye, goodbye, goodbye!)—can still bring tears to the eyes of older Italians and stir the emotions of young Italians at political protests.

For a traditional rendition of this rousing tune, click on:

Expressions and Sayings:

Venetian dialect: “Oh, va be’, s’ciao!” -- “Okay, never mind!”

Milanese dialect: “Se gh’inn gh’inn, se gh’inn no, s-ciao!”-- “If there is [money], there is; if there isn’t, goodbye!”