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ITALIAN WORD OF THE DAY

Italian expression of the day: ‘A occhio e croce’

It’ll take you roughly five minutes to master this Italian phrase.

Published: 29 March 2023 13:04 CEST
Updated: 19 April 2024 08:46 CEST
Italian word of the day: A occhio e croce
Photo: Annie Spratt/Unsplash/Nicolas Raymond

Italians aren’t exactly sticklers for precision. 

In fact, it could be argued that most have a natural (and exceedingly irritating) inclination to be as vague as they possibly can when expressing times, sizes and other types of measurement. 

That’s a big part of the reason why the expression a occhio e croce is so popular in ordinary, day-to-day Italian.

A occhio e croce, which is literally translatable as ‘by eye and cross’, is essentially used to refer to any calculation or judgement the speaker is unsure of. Its most immediate English equivalents are: approximately, roughly, more or less and give or take. 

Quante persone c’erano alla festa ieri?

Mah, 30 persone, a occhio e croce.

How many people were at the party yesterday?

Hmm, 30 people, give or take.

–

Quanto è distante casa tua da qui?

Credo due chilometri, a occhio e croce.

How far is your place from here?

Roughly two kilometres, I think.

As shown by the above examples, a occhio e croce generally follows the object the speaker is unsure of, though it can sometimes be used at the start of a sentence:

Quanta corda ti serve per la barca?

A occhio e croce, direi tre metri.

How much rope do you need for your boat?

At a rough guess, I’d say three metres.

In these cases, the expression is best translated as ‘at a guess’.

It’s also worth pointing out that some ‘lazy’ native speakers might sometimes remove the preposition a and only say occhio e croce. In such situations, the meaning remains the same.

Now that you more or less know how to use the expression, you might be wondering where it comes from. 

The phrase is largely thought to have originated within Florence’s Silk Guild in the Late Middle Ages.  

There, whenever one or more threads would come unthreaded, workers would have to rethread them a occhio, meaning by sight, and a croce, that is by following a rough cross pattern. Hence the expression a occhio e croce.

Do you have a favourite Italian word you’d like us to feature? If so, please email us with your suggestion.

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ITALIAN WORD OF THE DAY

Italian word of the day: Metà vs mezzo

These Italian words are both used to talk about 'half' of something, so what exactly is the difference and when should you use them?

Published: 23 April 2024 10:48 CEST
Updated: 23 April 2024 11:49 CEST
Italian word of the day: Metà vs mezzo

It’s often the case in Italy that you’ll find several words that mean something very similar, and it’s not always easy to know which one is appropriate. Our new mini series looks at some of the most common word pairs, and sorts out which should be used and when.

Why do I need to know the difference between metà and mezzo?

Because you’ll need to use both of them in daily conversation if you live in Italy, but the difference in meaning isn’t always clear.

What’s the difference?

When you want to talk about ‘half’ of something in Italian, it may seem as though you have two choices.

Depending on what you’re talking about, you could reach for either metà or mezzo (or mezza, which we’ll come to later) but many language learners say they’re not always sure which one to use in certain situations.

Put simply, the difference between metà and mezzo is much the same as the difference between ‘half’ and ‘middle’ in English.

Metà: a half, as in one of two equal parts of something.

Mezzo: the middle, as in equally distant from two points.

For example:

Ha mangiato metà torta

He ate half of the cake

Facciamo a metà

Let’s split it (in half)

E’ sdraiato in mezzo alla strada

He’s lying in the middle of the street

Non penso che ti dovrebbe mettere in mezzo

I don’t think she should be putting you in the middle of this

READ ALSO: Come stai vs come va

But is anything in Italian ever really that simple?

There are some specific situations where the two words seem to be used interchangeably, or where it’s not clear why one is typically used and not the other.

Confusion arises particularly around telling the time in Italian, as you could say:

Sono le undici e mezzo

It’s half past eleven

Il mio treno arriva alle 5.40: vediamoci dieci minuti prima, alla mezza.

My train arrives at 5.40: let’s meet ten minutes before, at half past.

Why in this case aren’t we using metà for ‘half’? And why is it sometimes mezza rather than mezzo?

The English ‘half past’ doesn’t translate literally into Italian. Mezzo is used here instead, since we’re talking about the ‘middle of’ the hour, the point equally distant between two hours.

This might take some getting used to for English native speakers, but it is pretty logical.

As for why it’s mezza in the second example, this isn’t because it needs to agree with the gender of the noun in the sentence.

In fact, dictionaries tell us it’s always more correct to use mezzo regardless (although many Italians themselves find this rule confusing.)

But, in this case, as the language guardians at Italy’s Accademia della Crusca explain, mezza may (if you prefer) be used instead of mezzo when we already know the time, or at least the hour, being talked about.

So if you had earlier told someone an event would start at 8pm, but it’s now been delayed by half an hour, you could then say:

Comincerà alle otto e mezza

But if you’re inviting someone for the first time, you’d probably stick to:

Alle otto e mezzo

This can be a lot to remember when you’re in the middle of a conversation, but with practice you’ll soon get a feel for which word sounds right in which context. 

Do you have an Italian word you’d like us to feature? If so, please email us with your suggestion.

Make sure you don’t miss any of our Italian words and expressions of the day: download our new app (available on Apple and Android) and then selecting the Italian Word of the Day in your Notification options via the User button.

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