The Italian word for hail, as in pellets of frozen rain, is grandine (feminine, plural: grandini). It derives from the Latin word of the same spelling. One way of translating the verb to hail is to use the verb cadere (to fall), as in cade la grandine (the hail falls), but it is just as …
The Italian word for flame is fiamma (feminine, plural: fiamme). Both the Italian and English words can be traced back to the Latin flamma of the same meaning. /fiàm·ma/ Some of the most common types of flames and the objects that produce them include: La fiamma della candela oscillava nel vento. The flame of the …
The word for today in Italian is oggi. It derives from the Latin hŏdie which itself is a contraction of hoc die (on this day). Ieri mi hai detto che l’incontro si sarebbe tenuto oggi, ma in realtà ho scoperto che si svolge domani! Yesterday you told me the meeting would be held today but …
An extremely useful word in Italian is volentieri and if you learn to use it correctly, you’ll be one step closer to sounding like a native speaker! It comes from the French word volontiers which in turn derives from the Latin voluntarie. Volentieri can translate in numerous ways depending on the context, though in every …
A handy word you will find yourself using all the time in Italian is abbastanza. It comes from the ancient form a (to) + bastanza (an antiquated derivative of bastare = to suffice). The doubling of the letter b can be attributed to a linguistic phenomenon called syntactic gemination. There are two predominant translations for …
Most people – with perhaps the exception of my minimalistic father who only ever travels with a teeny tiny bag – pack their belongings inside a valigia (feminine, plural: valige or valigie) when they go on holiday. The word derives from the Latin valisia, which possibly came from the Gaulish *valisia meaning leather bag. Some verbs …