from pp.9-10

252 ricordare to remember, to recall; to remind. From Latin recordare (“to remember”). Cognate with English record, Spanish recordar, French recorder. In spite of cognation, this word does not mean “to record”, which would be registrare. Example, ricordo ancora l’incidente (“I still remember the incident”).

253 riguardare to concern, to be about; to look at again. 474 guardare to look (at), to watch. Cognate with guard, ward, Spanish guardar and French garder (“to keep”; “to guard”). To guard something you have to watch it. Riguardare literally means “to look at again”. Repeating an action intensifies it, hence “to concern”. Examples, un libro che riguarda la vita delle donne (“a book that concerns / is about women’s lives”); per quanto mi riguarda (“as far as I’m concerned”); guardare la tv (“to watch TV”).

255 impresa enterprise, business, firm, company, undertaking. impresario entrepreneur; impresario. From imprendere (“to undertake”). Suppose we say undertake while Italians say in-take. Unrelated to English impression, which would be impressione in Italian. Try to think of impresario, which has entered English.

256 riuscire to be able to, to manage; to succeed. 555 uscire to exit, to go out. Uscire (“to exit”) is from Latin exire (“to exit”), cognate with English exit. To succeed means the products you made for sale can go out to the market or your fame goes out to the social circle. Alternatively, as a mnemonic, consider that US science is successful and goes out to the whole world. Note the irregular present singular forms of this word, èsco, èsci (also imperative), èsce. Examples, è riuscito a finire il lavoro (“he managed to finish the job”); esci subito dalla porta! (“get out of the door now!”).

258 città city (cognate). From Latin civitatem, the second syllable dropped for lack of stress. Also cognate with civic, Spanish ciuda (“city”), French cité (“historical city or town”). Note the plural of this word is also città although its preceding article still changes. Examples, la città (“the city”); le città (“the cities”).

259 soggetto subject (cognate). From Latin subiectus (“subject”). Change the first of the double consonant letters to a plosive sound, b, here to see the cognation. Unrelated to English suggest or Italian suggerire. Example, il servizio è soggetto a interruzione senza preavviso (“the service is subject to interruption without notice”).

260 lasciare to leave, to let, to allow. From Latin laxare (“to relax”, “to loosen up”). Cognate with the root of relax. Or if you know laissez-faire (“an economic policy of letting things take their own course without interference”, literally “let (it/them) do”), this word is cognate with French laissez. Example, lasciami in pace (“leave me alone”).

264 data date. Not to be confused with dato (“data” in singular, “datum”; “given”). As a mnemonic to help remember which is which, assume men like to work on data while women are interested in dating (although date here means differently). See also dato.

265 sotto under, below. From Latin subtus (“below”) < Latin sub + -tus (Latin suffix to form a past participle). Change the first t to b to see the origin. Cognate with Spanish sótano (“basement”), French sous (“below”).

267 soprattutto above all, mostly, especially. 698 sopra above. Cognate with supra- (“above”, “over”). Note soprattutto is not sopratutto, due to phonosyntactic doubling (syntactic doubling).

268 tipo type, kind, sort; (colloquial) guy. Note the second meaning (exactly as in Spanish), and its feminine form is tipa (“gal”). It’s not clear how it acquired this meaning. Think of “a type of guy”. Examples, questo tipo di alberi (“this kind of trees”); un bel tipo (“a nice guy”).

269 formazione training, education; formation. English formation does have a minor sense of “training”, more obvious in its adjective e.g the formative years.

271 forse maybe, perhaps. From Latin forsit (“perhaps”), from fors (“chance”) + sit (“be” in subjunctive). English fortune and fortuitous are traced to Latin fors.

273 seguente following, next, prossimo. 289 seguire to follow. From Latin sequens (“following”), sequire (“to follow”). Cognate with English sequent, sequel, Spanish siguiente (“following”). Examples, il giorno seguente / dopo (“the next day”); seguimi / seguitemi! (“follow me!”).

274 parere to seem, to appear. From Latin parere (“to appear”). Cognate with the root of English appear, with Spanish parecer, French paraître. Example, mi pare che sia buono (“I think it’s good”, literally “it seems to me that it is good”).