{"id":5783,"date":"2014-05-14T09:20:00","date_gmt":"2014-05-14T09:20:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/?p=5783"},"modified":"2016-03-08T15:55:59","modified_gmt":"2016-03-08T14:55:59","slug":"its-all-in-the-accent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/its-all-in-the-accent\/","title":{"rendered":"It’s All In The Accent"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last week Geoff wrote a silly blog about t\u00e8 (tea), which played on the fact that some Italian words change their meaning depending on whether they use an accent or not, e.g. t\u00e8<\/strong> (tea), te<\/strong> (you). Let\u2019s have a look at a few more words that fall into this category, plus some other cases in which we need to use an accent.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\n\n\n
\n

1. We use the accent to distinguish between two monosyllabic words which otherwise are written in exactly the same way:<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n

\u00e8<\/strong><\/span> = is; e<\/strong><\/span> = and: la rosa \u00e8<\/span> profumata e<\/span> rossa<\/strong> (the rose is scented and red)<\/p>\n

d\u00e0<\/strong><\/span> = he\/she gives; da<\/span><\/strong> = from: il sale d\u00e0<\/span> pi\u00f9 sapore al cibo<\/strong> (salt gives more flavour to food); Luca viene da<\/span> Genova<\/strong> (Luca comes from Genova)<\/p>\n

d\u00ec<\/strong><\/span> = day (old fashion or poetic); di<\/strong><\/span> = of: un bel d\u00ec<\/span> vedremo levarsi un fil di<\/span> fumo<\/strong> \u2026 (one lovely day we\u2019ll see a thread of smoke rising \u2026\u00a0 from Madama Butterfly by Puccini<\/span><\/em>)<\/p>\n

\n\n\n\n\n
\"07_hohenstein_madame_butterfly\"<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
CLICK ON THE IMAGE ABOVE TO LISTEN TO \u2018UN BEL D\u00cc VEDREMO\u2019<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n

l\u00e0<\/span><\/strong> = there; la<\/span><\/strong> = the (definite article fem sing), her\/it (direct object pronoun fem sing): la<\/span> gatta \u00e8 l\u00e0<\/span> sulla sedia<\/strong> (the cat is there on the chair)<\/p>\n

l\u00ec<\/span><\/strong> = there; li<\/span><\/strong> = them (direct object pronoun masc. plural): dove sono i giornali? li<\/span> ho messi l\u00ec<\/span> sul tavolo<\/strong> (where are the newspapers? I\u2019ve put them there on the table)<\/p>\n

n\u00e9 \u2026 n\u00e9<\/span><\/strong> = neither \u2026 nor; ne<\/span><\/strong> = of it\/them: non ho visto n\u00e9<\/span> l\u2019una n\u00e9<\/span> l\u2019altra<\/strong> (I haven\u2019t seen neither one nor the other); di uova ce ne<\/span> sono tre<\/strong> (eggs \u2026 there are three of them)<\/p>\n

s\u00e9<\/span><\/strong> = himself\/herself; se<\/span><\/strong> = if: l\u2019ha fatto da s\u00e9<\/span><\/strong> (he did it by himself); se<\/span> vai al mercato mi compri delle mele?<\/strong> (if you go to the market could you buy me some apples?)<\/p>\n

s\u00ec<\/span><\/strong> = yes; si<\/span><\/strong> = one\/you (impersonal pronoun) or himself\/herself\/themselves: hai capito come si<\/span> usa l\u2019accento?<\/strong> (have you understood how the accent is used? lit, how one uses the accent<\/em>) penso di s\u00ec<\/span> <\/strong>(I think so, lit. I think yes<\/em>)<\/p>\n

t\u00e8<\/span><\/strong> = tea; te<\/span><\/strong> = you (sing, informal) \u2026 see Geoff\u2019s blog: Senza T\u00e8<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

\n\n\n\n\n
\"3381469529C7C8A05677D97B8BBBE5\"<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
UNA TAZZA DI T\u00c8 \u2026 PER TE, GEOFF<\/span><\/strong><\/em><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n

2. We also use the accent in truncated words, i.e. words ending with a stressed vowel to indicate the correct pronunciation, e.g.:<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

andr\u00f2<\/strong> = I will go (future tense)<\/p>\n

caff\u00e8<\/strong> = coffee<\/p>\n

citt\u00e0<\/strong> = city\/town<\/p>\n

perch\u00e9<\/strong> = why\/ because<\/p>\n

perci\u00f2<\/strong> = therefore<\/p>\n

\n\n\n\n\n
\"072\"<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
UN BEL PERO \u2026 PER\u00d2 LE PERE SONO TROPPO DURE<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n

per\u00f2<\/strong> = but N.B. without the accent this becomes pero<\/strong> (with the stress on \u2018pe-\u2018) which is a pear tree.<\/p>\n

universit\u00e0<\/strong> = university<\/p>\n

virt\u00f9<\/strong> = virtue<\/p>\n

Obviously, this is not an comprehensive list, but it should give you an indication of how important it is to use the accent in Italian.<\/span><\/p>\n

Find out more about accents in Part 2<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\"\"

Last week Geoff wrote a silly blog about t\u00e8 (tea), which played on the fact that some Italian words change their meaning depending on whether they use an accent or not, e.g. t\u00e8 (tea), te (you). Let\u2019s have a look at a few more words that fall into this category, plus some other cases in…<\/p>\n

Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":5810,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[350347],"class_list":["post-5783","post","type-post","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-grammar","tag-how-to-use-the-accent-in-italian"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5783","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5783"}],"version-history":[{"count":23,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5783\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11205,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5783\/revisions\/11205"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5810"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5783"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5783"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5783"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}