Chris Christie wrote: ↑Sat Jul 11, 2020 3:10 am
And here we go, a 1910 example of Ital-American:
Letters sent to federal prison had to be in English or they would be held up until they could be translated and deemed appropriate (of course some of these instances may have been written by a translator in NY upon request by the sender):
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Example of a Castellammarese writing in his language, as stated, no Italian from Italy would find that hard to read.
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Fascinating documents, thanks for sharing them. While I'm admittedly not a native speaker, looking over the last letter from the Castellammarese it looks to me to simply be standard Italian, not Sicilianu (would welcome correction from someone fluent in both Italian and Sicilianu if I'm wrong here). Therefore it indeed would not have been difficult for anyone who was literate in standard Italian from anywhere to understand it.
From what I understand, while Sicilianu flourished as a courtly, written language in the late Medieval period (the first of the modern vernacular Italic languages to do so, predating the rise of Florentine literature), written Sicilianu had long since fallen into disuse by the 19th century. Thus by the time of the American migration anyone who was literate was by definition literate in Italian, not Sicilianu, which remained strongly entrenched as the oral, vernacular language of the working classes until it was largely displaced by Italian over the 20th century. Even before the Risorgimento, Florentine-derived Italian had become the lingua franca of the educated and literate strata across Italy, resulting in what was often a wide linguistic gulf between the upper class and the common working and peasant folk.
"Hey, hey, hey — this is America, baby! Survival of the fittest.”
Met a Bonanno today from Dyker Heights (likely no relation), he speaks Italian, he introduced himself as Boe-nan-noe. Middle "nan" rhymes with "can." I laughed and said "You too, huh?" He asked what and I said nothing.
I made to point to reference this because the way he said it sounds similar to the word "Banana," which may explain how Our Bonannos got that nickname.
This makes me think back to Valachi, I'd be very surprised if he knew how to spell consigliere, he was likely debriefed along with Italian agents who were able to understand what he was saying, or at least clarify he's saying counselor. Interesting how Consigliere was left in Italian but Sotto-capo wasn't. I wonder if this was reflective of the vernacular on the street or if the FBI decided capo, sottocapo and caporegime would be too confusing.
**Spoke to my relatives today in Alcamo and I asked them to say counselor, it's not a word that gets thrown around normally and it was "gawn-see-gli-air-ee." I also asked them also say it in slo-mo, enunciating each and every syllable. It's similar to what you hear in the movies: Emphasis on the 'e" ending. Outsiders also say Genovese as Jeh-no-veh-see when people from NY will say "Jenna-veese."
Gawn-see-gli-air-ee vs console-year. It's similar to how outsiders (including myself evidently) pronounce names. As a Sicilian who's lived on both sides of the Atlantic I find it interesting. Honestly, when a Brooklynite invoked the name D'Aquila I had no idea who he was inferring to. Dah'queeeee'luh vs Dah'quella. When I lived in Brooklyn my 'mafia cap' must not have been on because I never noticed any of this shit but then I wan't really looking into it.
This makes me think back to Valachi, I'd be very surprised if he knew how to spell consigliere, he was likely debriefed along with Italian agents who were able to understand what he was saying, or at least clarify he's saying counselor. Interesting how Consigliere was left in Italian but Sotto-capo wasn't. I wonder if this was reflective of the vernacular on the street or if the FBI decided capo, sottocapo and caporegime would be too confusing.
**Spoke to my relatives today in Alcamo and I asked them to say counselor, it's not a word that gets thrown around normally and it was "gawn-see-gli-air-ee." I also asked them also say it in slo-mo, enunciating each and every syllable. It's similar to what you hear in the movies: Emphasis on the 'e" ending. Outsiders also say Genovese as Jeh-no-veh-see when people from NY will say "Jenna-veese."
Gawn-see-gli-air-ee vs console-year. It's similar to how outsiders (including myself evidently) pronounce names. As a Sicilian who's lived on both sides of the Atlantic I find it interesting. Honestly, when a Brooklynite invoked the name D'Aquila I had no idea who he was inferring to. Dah'queeeee'luh vs Dah'quella. When I lived in Brooklyn my 'mafia cap' must not have been on because I never noticed any of this shit but then I wan't really looking into it.
It's seemed to me that a lot of the typical Italian-American pronunciations of words and names are more shaped by Napuletano (here meaning the whole southern boot apart from Southern Calabria and Taranto, not Naples more narrowly) phonetics than Sicilian phonetics. The common weakening to the point of elision of an unstressed word final vowel for example. So "Consigliere", comes out as something like "guhn-suh-LYEER-uh" or further weakened to "guhn-suh-LYEER". The pronunciation of the word final "e" in "Consigliere" as "ee" as you describe from your fam is from what I understand very typically Sicilian.
"Hey, hey, hey — this is America, baby! Survival of the fittest.”
This makes me think back to Valachi, I'd be very surprised if he knew how to spell consigliere, he was likely debriefed along with Italian agents who were able to understand what he was saying, or at least clarify he's saying counselor. Interesting how Consigliere was left in Italian but Sotto-capo wasn't. I wonder if this was reflective of the vernacular on the street or if the FBI decided capo, sottocapo and caporegime would be too confusing.
**Spoke to my relatives today in Alcamo and I asked them to say counselor, it's not a word that gets thrown around normally and it was "gawn-see-gli-air-ee." I also asked them also say it in slo-mo, enunciating each and every syllable. It's similar to what you hear in the movies: Emphasis on the 'e" ending. Outsiders also say Genovese as Jeh-no-veh-see when people from NY will say "Jenna-veese."
Gawn-see-gli-air-ee vs console-year. It's similar to how outsiders (including myself evidently) pronounce names. As a Sicilian who's lived on both sides of the Atlantic I find it interesting. Honestly, when a Brooklynite invoked the name D'Aquila I had no idea who he was inferring to. Dah'queeeee'luh vs Dah'quella. When I lived in Brooklyn my 'mafia cap' must not have been on because I never noticed any of this shit but then I wan't really looking into it.
I've often wondered about why consigliere has lasted as a popular term while capo and sottocapo became boss and underboss, though rappresentante still pops up every now and then. Considering you still find some references to sottocapi around that time I think one of the major contributing factors to the retention of consigliere was the scene in The Godfather where Michael explains to Kay how that position functions in a family.
'You don't go crucifying people outside a church; not on Good Friday.'
