Turin vs. Torino. Which is which?

[Raven]

There seems to have been some fallout over NBC's choice of using the name Torino instead of the more traditional name of Turin, with many people questioning why this is.

According to National Geographic News the official name of the city is indeed, Torino and it is the English language's mispronunciation of the towns name "Turin" that has lead to the misunderstanding. This after the city leaders of Torino petitioned the International Olympic Committee to use the official name of the town, Torino, rather than the english pronunciation "Turin".

Does this mean that the proper name of the shroud is "The Shroud of Torino"? Looks that way.


~ Raven ~

 

[buckytom]

i was wondering the same thing raven. thanks for the info.

americans, especially of italian heritage, butcher their native language. i wonder if that's what happened with torino.
i've noticed frequent dropping of the last vowel, such as in mozzarell - mozarella, prosciutt - prosciutto, calzon - calzone (pronounced calzon-eh), and the worst of all, gavadeal - cavatelli.

 

[licia]

BT, you are more observant than I am - I thought all the syllables were used.

 

[ronjohn55]

Could the US be using Turin to avoid confusion with this??

John

 

[licia]

Hey, we had a Torino - and it would fly.............We kept it about a year.

 

[buckytom]

licia, one explanation for italian americans dropping the last vowel is the way italian is pronounced or spoken. it often has great emphasis on the first or middle syllable of the word, and the last vowel tends to trail off. so i guess it was eventually just dropped.
japanese is exactly the opposite. each syllable is given equal weight when pronouncing it. it's kinda tricky to learn even pronunciation throughout. i prefer the hand gestured, flashy, stylish way of speaking italian.

don't get me started on german grammar or yiddish. i don't have the patience, or enough throat mucus...

 

[licia]

pewwwwwwwwwwwww!

 

[jennyema]

It's not unusual to "Americanize" pronounciations and spellings of foreign places (and words).

In America, we usually call/spell it "Cologne" Germany, when in Germany it's "Köln"

 

[urmaniac13]

Actually, "modifying" the names of certain locations is a fairly common practice, not only among the English speakers.

In Italian,
London becomes Londra,
Paris becomes Parigi,
Moscow becomes Mosca,
Frankfurt becomes Francoforte,
Cornwall becomes Cornovaglia, to name just a few example.
And Munich is actually called "Monaco". now THAT is confusing!!

Also one thing I was always wondering... posing this question as there are some German speakers as well as those who have studied the language... It is German in English, "Tedesco" in Italian, "Aleman" in Spanish, then finally in its original language it is "Deutsche"... all of them so totally different and seemingly unrelated does anyone have any explanation for all these differences?

 

[kadesma]

I'm wondering if part of it might be the way we hear a name or word...We had many Assiriyan patients whose names were much like ours if you looked at the spelling and sounded it out..Koni-Connie, Fransah-Francis, Youseph-Joseph, Pieter, Peter..I do know my in-laws Americanized their names when they arrived here, I'm sure to fit in better.I would also imagine, when people arrived here years ago, and had to go to Ellis Island, I don't think the people here were to careful in spelling out the names correctly. My mother in law had no birth certificate, as back then only the priest or reverends of the churches put down that information at baptisim, therefore she was named Vitorina, instead of the name her mother chose, which was Victoria!! I wonder!!!


kadesma

 

[Eilen]

I was listening to NPR yesterday and they have decided to use 'Turin' because that's the MLA standard; though the major networks have decided to go with 'Torino.' At least they're close in pronunciation--Florence sounds nothing like Firenze (sp?)!

 

[mudbug]

I like Gaeta - sounds like "guy ate a...."

so appropriate for this forum

 

[RDG]

Really curious.... For me, as urmaniac has said, the question is totally different. The biggest difficulty for an italian-tongue guy is to connect the different pronounces that an english name can have, depending from the various zones in which it is pronounced . In Italian, all the words "Ought to" have the same pronounce. Then, there are different slangs (I did'nt understand my grandmother, whe she was speaking a very strict milanese slang with her sister).
In order to the last syllabe, in italian it is extremely important, becaus it generally indicates "how many" and "who" the name indicates. So, "calzonE" is ONE calzone, calzonI are more than one. Good taste, in every way.....