Italian

How to spell italian

7 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce italian

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does italian mean?

1. adjectiveRelating to Italy, its people, its language, or its culture.
2. nounA native or citizen of Italy, or the language spoken there.

Italian in a sentence

• adjective

  They booked a table at the new italian restaurant near the office.

• noun

  He is learning italian before his trip to Rome.

• adjective

  The museum displayed several italian paintings from the Renaissance.

• noun

  As a fluent italian, she translated the contract for the firm.

Where does italian come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word descends from the Latin place name Italia, the ancient term for the Italian peninsula, to which English added the familiar suffix -ian, meaning 'belonging to' or 'coming from'. The Latin Italia itself may go back to an Oscan word vitelliu, thought to mean 'land of young cattle' or 'land of calves', a memory of the region's herding past, though scholars debate the detail. English picked the word up in the 1400s, partly through French and Italian usage, to describe the people, language, and culture of Italy. The single letter trap is simple but persistent: there is one 't' and a double 'l', the reverse of what many writers instinctively reach for. Note also that, like all nationality words, it is conventionally capitalised in running text even though the bare stored form here is lowercase.

How the word is built

• Ital- (from Latin Italia, the land of Italy)
• -ian (suffix meaning 'belonging to' or 'native of')