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Legno or Legna ?

It's coming on winter, at least in the northern hemisphere, where Italy is located.

In many places in Italy, people heat their houses using wood. Or, In the country and in small villages, lots of people have fireplaces in their kitchens. 

 

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Wood is Wood, right?

Right and wrong. In English, we think of wood as wood, whatever its use. But in Italian, there are two similar but different words, depending on what we do with the wood.

 

Legno

To construct something we use legno (wood), a masculine noun. This has its root in the Latin noun "lignum." 

 

Interestingly, Italians use two basic prepositions with legno to correspond to "wooden": in and di which can both mean "of."

 

Questo meraviglioso piano in legno

This marvelous wooden surface

si chiama spianatoia

is called a pastry board

e serve proprio per impastare la nostra pasta fresca.

and it's used exactly for making our fresh pasta dough.

Captions 90-92, L'Italia a tavola - Culurgiones D'Ogliastra

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Veniva impastato in casa,

The dough was worked at home,

proprio su quella superficie di legno

right on that wooden surface

e poi messa [sic: messo], questo impasto,

and then this dough was put

su quella specie di tavola, veniva portato al forno,

on that type of wooden board and brought to the oven,

perché in casa non c'erano dei forni.

because there were no ovens in houses.

Captions 64-68, Meraviglie - EP. 1 Part 12

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Legna

To build a fire for heating or cooking, we use the feminine noun la legna. This comes, again from the Latin, from the plural of "lignum": "ligna." In fact, la legna, just like the collective noun "firewood," usually refers to a collection of pieces of wood to be used for burning. 

 

If we ask what kind of wood is used, then we can use legno. In the following example, someone is asking the pizzaiolo what kind of wood he uses in his forno a legna.

 

Quello è il forno a legna. Che legno usate?

That's the wood oven. What kind of wood do you use?

Captions 39-40, Antonio - presenta la Pizzeria Escopocodisera

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To be even more specific, we can expand on legna: legna da ardere (wood for burning/firewood). The following example is from a fascinating video on Yabla about olive trees and making olive oil.

 

Quando avveniva questo distacco delle due parti dell'ulivo,

When this detachment took place of the two parts of the olive tree,

una della due parti veniva sacrificata come legna da ardere.

one of the two parts was sacrificed as firewood.

Captions 47-48, Olio Extra Vergine Pugliese - Introduzione e cenni storici

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What are some contexts for legna?

The fireplace is often called il camino (note the single M) and more often than not, the diminutive is used:  il caminetto. The chimney is the canna fumaria (the smokestack). 

 

In place of la  caldaia (furnace, hot water heater), some people have una stufa a legna (wood stove).

 

And let's not forget that the best pizza is said to be made in a forno a legna (wood-burning oven). In these cases the preposition a is used, referring to the function. What makes it run?

 

Peppe ha infornato la pizza nel forno a legna, che è un forno tradizionale.

Peppe has put the pizza in the wood oven, which is a traditional oven.

Caption 48, Antonio - presenta la Pizzeria Escopocodisera

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This goes for bread, too.

 

Antico a lievitazione naturale, cotto a legna, ci sono altri tipi...

Traditional sourdough, baked in a wood oven, there are other kinds...

Caption 64, Anna e Marika - Il pane

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BANNER PLACEHOLDER

Now you know the difference between legno and legna. They are both right; you just need to know the context. 

Pasta and More Pasta

 

The most immediate image that comes to mind when hearing the noun pasta is a nice plate of it, at the table. When we say la pasta, we're referring, more often than not, to the dish we know and love.

 

 

But in Italian, pasta means other things as well. In fact, pasta refers to something that has been impastato (kneaded, mixed into a dough or paste at some point). Think of the similarity of pasta and “paste.” Think of the simple paste you can make with flour and water. That’s a kind of pasta, or dough.

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A recent video at Yabla is a further episode about a shop in Rome that specializes in gift packaging, and personalized gifts made of carta (paper), cartone (cardboard), but also tessuto (cloth/fabric) and pasta modellabile (modeling clay). Think “playdough” to get the connection.

 

Abbiamo una pasta sintetica.

We have a synthetic modeling clay.

Vendiamo una pasta sintetica nel negozio, infrangibile.

We sell synthetic modeling clay in the shop, shatterproof.

Caption 1, Professioni e mestieri - Belle Arti - La pasta modellabile

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Pasta sometimes means “dough.”

 

Quindi, si stende la pasta della pizza.

So, you spread out the pizza dough.

Caption 10, Antonio - presenta la Pizzeria Escopocodisera

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Dough is also called l’impasto (the dough). L’impasto can mean any mixture, usually a bit thick.

 

L'impasto della pizza è composto da: acqua, farina, lievito e sale.

The pizza dough is made of: water, flour, yeast, and salt.

Caption 6, Antonio - presenta la Pizzeria Escopocodisera

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When people talk about pasta asciutta, what do they mean? It literally means “dry pasta.” You might think it’s the opposite of fresh pasta (usually, but not always, made with eggs and flour). But no, it means “not in broth.” There may be a sauce, but the pasta dish can be eaten with a fork, not a spoon.

 

Eh, quindi per esempio, la pasta asciutta,

Uh, so for example, pasta,

così apprezzata da, da tutta l'Italia...

so appreciated by, by all of Italy...

Caption 17, L'arte della cucina - I Luoghi del Mondo

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Even in olive oil production, we can refer to una pasta. It’s the resulting paste from crushing the olives.

 

Le olive vengono frantumate, cioè spappolate,

The olives are crushed, that is, they become a mush,

nocciolo e polpa insieme e ne risulta una pasta chiara.

pit and pulp together, and the result is a light colored paste.

Captions 36-37, L'olio extravergine di oliva - Il frantoio

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Una pasta can also mean any kind of sweet roll that you have for colazione (breakfast) or spuntino (snack) when you’re in an Italian bar. Other names for this item are pezzo dolce (sweet piece) in Tuscany, or brioche (with various spellings, as it comes from the French), and cornetto (croissant) in various areas of Italy.

Pago un caffè e due paste.
I’ll pay for a coffee and two sweet rolls.

Now you know there’s more to pasta than just spaghetti!

 

For pasta recipes on Yabla, here are a few:

 

Adriano shows us how to make pasta alla carbonara.

 

Three little cooks prepare a delicious pasta dish dedicated to the tricolore (the Italian flag).

 

Here’s a personal pasta recipe presented by Arianna.

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Buon appetito and have fun making things out of pasta modellabile!

 

Ecco: An Ancient and Useful Adverb

Ecco (here it is), from the Latin ecce or eccum, is about presenting a person, thing, or idea and inviting you to perceive it at the very moment it appears.

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Ecco la primavera is a 14th century song by Francesco Landini. It’s a song about the coming of spring. We might translate the title as “Behold, Spring Has Come!” The entire Italian text with a non-literal English translation opposite may be viewed here.

 

So this way of calling our attention to something goes way back. Despite its very ancient origins, it’s a popular word that Italians use constantly. We say ecco to call attention to something or someone arriving, or when we find something we were looking for.

 

We no longer use the word “behold” in English, but we might say, “well, will you look at that,” “there you go!” In the following example, Anna gets her question about long-lasting bread answered before she asks it, so she says ecco, to acknowledge the fact.

 

È un pane che dura tantissimo.

It's a kind of bread that lasts a very long time.

Ah ecco! Perché volevo appunto chiedere,

Ah, there you go! Because I wanted to ask you just that,

qual è il tipo di pane che dura di più.

what type of bread lasts the longest?

Captions 61-62, Anna e Marika - Il pane

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Ecco can stand alone (just about anywhere in a sentence) as in the above example, or can precede a noun to present it, as in ecco la primavera. When a pronoun is used, on the other hand, ecco gets attached to it. This goes for all the different direct object pronouns (mi, ti, lo, la, ci, vi, li, and le).

 

Aha. Sì. Eccolo, eccolo, è arrivato. Sì, sì.

Aha. Yes. Here he is, here he is, he's here. Yes, yes.

Captions 13-14, Francesca - alla guida

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One common way ecco is used is with perché (why, because) to mean “that’s why” or “you see why” or even “here’s why.”

 

Ecco perché io non me ne voglio andare.

That's why I don't want to leave it.

Caption 5, Basilicata Turistica - Non me ne voglio andare

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Another common usage is ecco qua (here you are). It calls your visual attention to what is being presented. In the following example, a pizzaiolo (pizza maker) is removing a mouth-watering pizza from his forno a legna (wood oven)!

 

È quasi pronta... Ecco qua!

It's almost ready... Here it is!

Captions 26-27, Antonio - presenta la Pizzeria Escopocodisera

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Ecco is also a filler word much like “OK,” “you know,” or “that's all” that can wrap up what one has said so far:

 

Io vorrei semplicemente che ognuno avesse la sua porzione, ecco.

I would simply like everyone to have his portion, that's all.

Caption 19, Un medico in famiglia Stagione 1 - EP2 - Il mistero di Cetinka

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Or it can introduce what one is about to say, much like “look,” “this is how it is,” or “here’s the thing.”

 

Però, ecco, per quanto mi riguarda,

But, there you go, from my point of view,

io vedo lì una cassata siciliana!

I see a Sicilian Cassata there!

Caption 11, Susanna Cutini - Dolci delle tradizioni di Pasqua

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Ecco is often difficult or even impossible to translate accurately. But once you start listening for the word and noticing it, you'll get a feel for it, and it will start creeping into your conversation naturally. Doing a Yabla search will display a very long list of examples from videos, so you can see the different contexts in which it’s used.

 

Ecco! (And there you have it!)

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P.S. If you neglect to pronounce the double "c" in ecco, you'll obtain eco which means "echo."