Italian word of the day
| Pronunciation | |
| English translation | Butterfly |
| Origin | From the Latin word far-far, which is meant to evoke the sound butterflies make when they flap their wings |
Different forms of farfalla
Like most nouns in Italian, farfalla has two articles (definite or indefinite articles) and two numbers (singular or plural).
Una farfalla
A butterfly
Delle farfalle
Some butterflies
La farfalla
The butterfly
Le farfalle
The butterflies
Examples
| Questo bruco diventerà una bellissima farfalla. | This caterpillar will become a beautiful butterfly. |
| La vita di una farfalla dura tre giorni. | The life of a butterfly is three days. |
| Marco afferrò la farfalla tra pollice e indice. | Marco caught the butterfly between his thumb and forefinger. |
Farfalla, alongside farfallino, small butterfly, is also the Italian translation for bow-tie. It is so called because its shape resembles a butterfly! It can also be translated as papillon, from the French word for “butterfly”.
Farfallino is a masculine noun.
| Il farfallino | The bow-tie | |
| Il papillon | The bow-tie |
Examples:
| A mio figlio Sheldon piace indossare i papillon. | My son Sheldon likes to wear bow ties. |
| Ho comprato un farfallino a pois rossi. | I bought a red polka dot bow tie. |
Farfallone
The –one Italian suffix is used to make things bigger. In this sense, farfallone literally means big butterfly, but it actually translates to womanizer. This is because this type of partner has a tendency to “fly away” to other women.
| Il farfallone | The womanizer, the flirt |
Examples:
| Il mio ex era un vero farfallone. | My ex was a real flirt. |
| Con farfallone si intende un uomo che corteggia molte donne. | A “big butterfly” is defined as a man who flirts with many women. |
Related words
There are many adjectives that are used together with butterfly in Italian to describe it. Some of these are…
| Farfalla notturna | Night butterfly, moth | |
| Farfalla colorata | Colored butterfly | |
| Farfalla stupenda | Beautiful butterfly |
For example, you can say…
| Una farfalla notturna continua a svolazzare attorno alla lampada. | A night butterfly keeps fluttering around the lamp. |
| Ho appena visto una farfalla stupenda sulla pianta di rose in giardino. | I have just seen a beautiful butterfly on the rose plant in the garden. |
The antennae of a butterfly are called antenne, from the feminine singular word antenna.
The wings are called ali, from the feminine singular ala.
Le ali di una farfalla sono delicatissime.
The wings of a butterfly are very, very delicate.
Butterflies are born from caterpillars, bruchi, from the masculine bruco.
| Il bruco | The caterpillar |
When the metamorphosis (metamorfosi) occurs, they wrap themselves in a bozzolo, a cocoon.
| Il bozzolo | The cocoon |
A butterfly in Italian can most often svolazzare, to fly about, or simply volare, to fly.
| Svolazzare | To fly about | |
| Volare | To fly |
| La farfalla vola nell’aria e si posa sulla mano del bambino. | The butterfly flies through the air and rests on the child’s hand. |
A butterfly in Italian can also sfarfallare, which means to flit about.
This verb is also used to translate to flicker when talking about dying lightbulbs.
| Sfarfallare | To flicker |
| La luce sta sfarfallando. È ora di cambiare la lampadina. | The light is flickering. It’s time to change the bulb. |
When it’s time for the bruco to come out of its cocoon, the verb uscire dal bozzolo, to come out of the cocoon, is used.
This verb is also used figuratively to describe very shy people who are doing something that requires some courage on their part, like going to a party.
| Uscire dal bozzolo | To come out of the cocoon |
| Dovresti uscire un po’ dal bozzolo, Veronica, e divertirti un po’. | You should come out of the cocoon a little bit, Veronica, and have some fun. |
People who like to hunt butterflies are called collezionisti, collectors. They hunt down butterflies with a retino, a net, also called acchiappafarfalle. To hunt is translated into Italian as cacciare or andare a caccia (to go hunting).
| Andare a caccia di farfalle | To hunt butterflies | |
| Acchiappafarfalle | Butterfly catcher |
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