A very easy adjective for English speakers to remember in Italian is timido, meaning shy, bashful or timid. Both timido and the English timid derive from the Latin word timidus.
As with many adjectives in Italian, the ending tells you whether the subject is masculine or feminine / singular or plural.
- timido = masculine, singular
- timida = feminine, singular
- timidi = masculine, plural
- timide = feminine, plural
Fin da bambino, sono sempre stato molto timido.
Since I was a child, I’ve always been shy.
Timido can also function as a noun to refer specifically to a person who is shy. An extremely shy person might receive the nickname timidone (masculine) or timidona (feminine), with the suffixes -one and -ona meaning big.
Pietro era il timido del gruppo.
Pietro was the shy one in the group.
Dai, non fare la timidona. Fatti coraggio!
Come on, don’t be so shy. Show some courage!
Some close synonyms of timido include:
- introverso = introverted
- riservato = reserved
- chiuso = closed
- timoroso = fearful
An additional meaning of timido that has nothing to do with shyness is faint, feeble or weak. It is used for actions that lack conviction or enthusiasm (e.g. un timido tentativo = a feeble attempt), or things that exert only a small force (e.g. un timido raggio di sole = a faint ray of light).
Heather Broster is a graduate with honours in linguistics from the University of Western Ontario. She is an aspiring polyglot, proficient in English and Italian, as well as Japanese, Welsh, and French to varying degrees of fluency. Originally from Toronto, Heather has resided in various countries, notably Italy for a period of six years. Her primary focus lies in the fields of language acquisition, education, and bilingual instruction.
