Italian Language Blog

Well done everybody who had a go at my airport quiz! Her are the answers, with a little bit of extra information:

1. Parma, aeroporto Giuseppe Verdi. Verdi was born in 1813 in Roncole, near Busseto, north west of Parma. You can read about the role of Giuseppe Verdi during the Italian Risorgimento in this post: Viva Verdi. He wrote his famous opera Aida for the inauguration of the Cairo Opera Theatre, which followed the opening of the Suez Canal.

2. Pisa, aeroporto Galileo Galilei. Galilei was born in Pisa in 1564. According to Stephen Hawking, Galileo probably bears more of the responsibility for the birth of modern science than anybody else, and Albert Einstein called him the father of modern science.

3. Firenze, aeroporto Amerigo Vespucci. Vespucci was born in Florence in 1454. Between 1499 and 1502 Vespucci participated as observer for the king of Portugal in several voyages that explored the east coast of South America. On these voyages he realized that South America extended much further south than previously thought, and came to the conclusion that this was not part of Asia, but an entirely new continent which he named: The New World. It was the German Martin Waldseemüller who gave this new continent the name America (after Amerigo) in 1507 in his ‘Cosmographiae Introductio’.

4. Roma Fiumicino, aeroporto Leonardo da Vinci. Well, what can I say about Leonardo da Vinci? He was born in 1452 in the village of Vinci near Firenze. His Monna Lisa is the most famous and most reproduced portrait in the world. Sometime ago we wrote a series of articles about it entitled ‘Tales of la Gioconda’. You can read them by clicking on the links:La Gioconda part 1, La Gioconda part 2, and La Gioconda part 3

5. Venezia, aeroporto Marco Polo. Marco polo was born in Venezia in 1254. The story of his travels are recorded in the book Il Milione (The Million), also known in English as ‘The Travels of Marco Polo’.

6. Catania, aeroporto Vincenzo Bellini. Bellini was born in Catania, Sicilia, in 1801. His most famous operas are La Sonnambula, Norma, and I Puritani.

7. Bologna, aeroporto Guglielmo Marconi. Marconi was born in Bologna in 1874. He began his experiments with wireless telegraphy at the age of twenty in the attic of his own home, with just the help of his butler Mignani.

8. Genova, aeroporto Cristoforo Colombo. Most scholars generally agree that Christopher Columbus, whose Italian name was Cristoforo Colombo, was born in the Italian city of Genoa in 1451. In 1477 he moved to Portugal, one of the greatest world powers of that time, where he adopted the Portuguese translation of his name, Christovão Colom. Then in 1485 he settled in Spain where his name changed once again to Cristóbal Colón.

9. Verona, aeroporto Valerio Catullo. The Latin poet Gaius Valerius Catullus was born in Verona in 84 BC. He greatly influenced later poets such as Ovid, Horace and Virgil.

10. Palermo, aeroporto Falcone – Borsellino. I recently wrote two articles to commemorate the twentieth anniversary of the killings of these two Sicilian magistrates. You can read them by clicking on the following links: La strage di Capaci, and Via D’Amelio

So, here’s a little quiz for you. Many Italian airports are named after famous Italians. Below I’ve given ten descriptions of people who have had an airport named after them. Who are they, and which airports are their names linked to?

Please leave your answers in the ‘Leave a Reply’ section at the end. Don’t worry if you can’t get them all.

1. A famous opera composer who was born in the north of Italy in 1813 and died in 1901. Many of his works were considered symbolic of the Italian struggle against foreign powers by the patriots who fought in the wars for the independence of Italy in the 19th Century. He also wrote the opera for the inauguration of the Suez Canal.

2. Astronomer, mathematician, physicist and philosopher born in 1564. Amongst his many scientific inventions and improvements are the telescope and the military compass. For his theories about the rotation of the Earth he was condemned as an heretic by the Catholic Church, and only ‘rehabilitated’ by it in 1992.

3. Navigator, geographer and cartographer born in 1454. He demonstrated that Brazil and the West Indies weren’t part of the Asian continent, but a totally new continent, which he called the New World, and which later on was named after him.

4. Painter, architect, mathematician, engineer, inventor, anatomist, geologist, musician, born in 1452. In his world famous enigmatic portrait he developed the use of aerial perspective and the sfumato technique.

5. A merchant, born in 1254, who travelled the Silk Road to China with his father and uncle, where he was a guest of the Kublai Khan. After he returned to Italy, he was taken prisoner by the Genoese, and during his captivity he dictated the story of his travels to Rustichello da Pisa.

6. At the foot of mount Etna lies an airport dedicated to a romantic opera composer who was born in Sicily in 1801 and died at the young age of 34. This quintessential composer of the Bel Canto style created characteristic vocal melodies which are pure and sensuous in expression.

7. Physicist and inventor born in 1874, he is known as the father of long distance radio transmissions. In 1909 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics, together with Karl Ferdinand Braun, "in recognition of their contributions to the development of wireless telegraphy".

8. An explorer and a navigator, he was born in 1451. On the 3rd of August 1492 he departed from Palos de la Frontera in Spain with three ships: Santa Maria, Pinta and Niña. This journey marks the beginning of the modern era in Western history.

9. In the town of two famous literary lovers, the airport is dedicated to a Latin poet who was born in 84 BC. He was a fierce opponent of Cicero. Many of his love poems were dedicated Clodia Metelli, whom he called Lesbia, in honour of the famous Greek poetess Sappho from Lesbos.

10. This airport was recently named after two famous magistrates killed by the Mafia. The first judge was killed on the 24th of May 1992 on the motorway near the Capaci exit as he was returning from that same airport. His colleague was killed on the 19th of July 1992 in Via D’Amelio, as he was leaving his mother’s apartment.

I’ll publish the answers on Friday, good luck!

A few days ago Geoff wrote an article about the effects of this summer’s draught on Il Parco Naturale dell’Uccellina in Maremma, which reminded me of a folk song that I love. My professor of Topography at the University of Pisa used to sing it during our archaeological campaigns in Vada, near Livorno. Maremma is a wide region situated between Tuscany and Lazio, from Rosignano Marittimo, south of Livorno, to Civitavecchia north of Roma. This region had always been very marshy, and was therefore infested with malaria carrying mosquitos. The quality of life there was very poor. Attempts at drainage works had been made since Roman times, but malaria remained a big problem for centuries. It was only at the end of the 18th and beginning of the 19th centuries, when Tuscany became Granducato di Toscana under the Austrian Asburgo Lorena dynasty, that la bonifica (the drainage of the land) was successfully undertaken on a large scale. But results came at a price: in 1824 Granduca Ferdinando III died from malaria contracted while inspecting the drainage works in Maremma.

Maremma Amara (Bitter Maremma) is the title of this anonymous folk song, also known as Tutti mi dicon Maremma (Everybody tells me Maremma), from its opening line. The origins of the song are unknown, but it’s widely believed that it was written at the beginning of the 19th century, during i lavori di bonifica (the drainage works). During this period farmers all over Tuscany were given incentives to go and work the land in Maremma, but many would never return home, having lost their lives to either malaria or typhus. For this reason, one of the most common forms of swearing in Tuscany is the expression Maremma maiala (literally: pig Maremma).

This song was rediscovered in the Sixties by the Tuscan folk singer and musicologist Caterina Bueno. Maremma amara must be sung very slowly, almost dragged out, in order to depict the pain of those who lost their beloved in the infected land of Maremma, and to portray the leaden pace of the malaria ravaged farmers. Here are its sad lyrics, followed by my English translation:

 Maremma amara (click on the song title to hear the music)

Tutti mi dicon Maremma, Maremma,
ma a me mi pare una Maremma amara.
L’uccelo che ci va perde la penna,
io c’ho perduto una persona cara.

Sia maledetta Maremma Maremma,
sia maledetta Maremma e chi l’ama.
Sempre mi trema il cor quando ci vai
perché ho paura che non torni mai.

Sia maledetta Maremma Maremma,
sia maledetta Maremma e chi l’ama.

Bitter Maremma

Everybody tells me Maremma, Maremma,
but to me it seems a bitter Maremma.
The bird that goes there looses its feather,
I’ve lost a dear person there.

Cursed be Maremma Maremma
Cursed be Maremma and those who love it.
Every time you go there my heart trembles
because I worry that you will never come back.

Cursed be Maremma Maremma
Cursed be Maremma and those who love it.