Heather Broster
The word bruciapelo (masculine, invariable) is mostly seen in the expression a bruciapelo which literally means point-blank or at point-blank range. It is formed of two words: the verb bruciare (to burn) and the noun pelo (a single body hair). The idea is that if a gun is shot at very close range, it can …
The word for an artist in Italian is artista. Despite the -a ending, this noun applies to both male and female artists, with the respective plurals being artisti (for men or mixed groups) and artiste (for women). One way of telling whether the artist in question is male or female is by looking at the …
The word for doll is bambola (feminine, plural: bambole) in Italian. Like the English equivalent, it is used to describe any small model of a human figure, typically a baby, girl or woman. Similar to the word bambino (child), bambola is a derivative of bambo, which is an obsolete term meaning child or foolish. Many …
When I was a child, I would always look forward to Saturday mornings, as that was the day I’d receive a dollar from my dad to put towards whatever toy I was hankering after at the time. In Italian, the word for pocket money or allowance is paghetta (feminine, plural: paghette). Paghetta is the diminutive …
Snello is an adjective in Italian that means slender or slim. It usually refers to a person’s body or certain parts of the body. Interestingly, according to Treccani, it derives, not from Latin, but from the Germanic “snell” meaning nimble or quick. (“Schnell” means “fast” in German.) Indeed, this is how the word was originally …
The word for cherry in Italian is ciliegia (feminine). According to Treccani, the proper plural form is ciliegie, but up until the middle of the last century, the spelling ciliege was also fairly widespread. It comes from the Latin ceresia, which in turn derives from the Greek κερασος. The word for cherry tree is formed …