Rummaging around the web, looking for something else, I stumbled across this opening line in an essay on Italian dialects: "Dialect is the elf rather than the genius of place, and a dwarfish master of the magic of local things." [Alice Meynell. 1914. Essays, "Little Language"] I've been thinking about Liguria lately, that tight, cramped little province — whence my father's family came — jammed up between the sea and the mountains, stretched out between France and Pisa. The Italian Riviera is divided into two parts: di Ponente and di Levante (West and East, setting and rising). Byron and Shelley lived there. Dickens mentions in passing during his visit, the local dialect, Zeneise (genovese, Genoese).
The ruined chapel, on the picturesque and beautiful sea-shore, was dedicated, once upon a time, to Saint John the Baptist. I believe there is a legend that Saint John's bones were received there, with various solemnities, when they were first brought to Genoa; for Genoa possesses them to this day. When there is any uncommon tempest at sea, they are brought out and exhibited to the raging weather, which they never fail to calm. In consequence of this connection of Saint John with the city, great numbers of the common people are christened Giovanni Baptista, which latter name is pronounced in the Genoese patois `Batcheetcha,' like a sneeze. To hear everybody calling everybody else Batcheetcha, on a Sunday, or festa-day, when there are crowds in the streets, is not a little singular and amusing to a stranger.
[Charles Dickens. 1846. Pictures from Italy, chapter 4]
I occasionally monitor a news group about and written in the dialect, and there are some good websites dedicated to it.
[Addendum, 06/19/02: Entry in Hugo Plomteux. 1975. I dialetti della Ligure orientale odierna. Baciccia. "nome proprio (di battesimo) comunissimo in Liguria ... Benchè sia conosciuto anche in piemontese (bacicia 'uomo scemo'), in milanese (stesso senso), e nei dialetti italiani della Svizzera (nel senso di 'sempliciotto'; anche un nome di gatto), è una forma tipicamente ligure. In Italia settentrionale bacicia vuol dire ormai 'genovese'. In Argentina, dove sono numerossimi i Genovesi, bachicha ha preso il significato di sempliciotto', o anche 'italiano in generale'. Nel Messico existe inoltre il gergale embachichar 'rubare'.]
[Addendum, 09/05/04: Translation of the Plomteux excerpt. Baciccia. "Proper baptismal name, very common in Liguria. Although, it's also known in Piedmontese (bacicia 'foolish man'), in Milanese (in the same sense), and in the Italian dialects of Switzerland (in the sense of 'simpleton' [sempliciotto 'a man lacking in all malice, rather stupid or foolish'], also the name of a cat), and a typically Ligurian form. In Southern Italy bacicia is now used for 'Genoese'. In Argentina, where Genoese are quite numerous, bachicha has taken on the meaning of 'simpleton', or also 'Italian in general'. In Mexico, moreover, there exists the slang term embachichar 'to steal, rob'.]
Is there anyway you could rpovide a translation to english of the excerpt: "Hugo Plomteux"
Thanks
Posted by: Nickb on September 4, 2004 08:38 PM