Heather Broster
The Italian word trucco (masculine, plural: trucchi) has different meanings. One of the first that comes to mind is make-up. It can be used in reference to cosmetics applied to the face in order to beautify a person’s appearance, as well as theatrical make-up used to alter a person’s face for live performances, film or …
The word for magic in Italian is magia (feminine, plural: magie). Both words can be traced back to the Latin magica, which in turn comes from the Greek magike (‘the art of magus’). Below are some useful verbs you’ll often see used with magia: Nel medioevo, tutti credevano nella magia. In the Middle Ages, everyone …
The word for both peanut and the peanut plant in Italian is arachide (feminine, plural: arachidi). Just as you can call a peanut a groundnut, goober or monkey nut in English, Italian too has three synonyms: nocciola americana, pistacchio di terra and cece di terra. Le arachidi sono il mio snack preferito. Peanuts are my …
Avere (to have) is one of the most important words in the Italian language. Not only does it function on its own as a verb but it also forms an essential component of compound tenses such as the passato prossimo (present perfect) and futuro anteriore (future perfect). For this reason, it appears in numerous idiomatic …
Only a couple of days ago, we published an article about the word for lightning (fulmine) so it would be remiss of us if we didn’t talk about its partner in crime tuono (masculine, plural: tuoni) which is the word for thunder in Italian. Tuono derives from the verb tuonare (or the old literary variation …
When giving someone a present on a special occasion, such as their birthday or at Christmas, we often accompany the act of giving with a phrase such as «This is for you». The way you would say this phrase in Italian ultimately depends on the grammatical gender of the gift in question. If it is …