Tuesday 6 January 2009

Dacci oggi il nostro pane quotidiano,

Padre nostro, che sei nei cieli,
sia santificato il tuo nome,
venga il tuo regno, sia fatta la tua volontà,
come in cielo così in terra.
Dacci oggi il nostro pane quotidiano,
Dacci

'Dacci' is actually two words contracted. The first comes from 'dare', yet another common irregular verb:

dare(to) give, giving
(io) doI give
(tu) daiyou give
(lui/lei/Lei) dàhe/she/it gives (you give)
(noi) diamowe give
(voi) dateyou give (plural)
(loro) dannothey give

'da'!' or 'dai!' is the imperative form for 'dare' in 'tu' (the familiar you). That is to say, it's how you tell, or ask, someone you're on familiar terms with to give something. 'dai' is pronounced fairly similarly to 'die' in English, and can be used to mean 'come on!', so during the world cup, when it sounded like Monica was urging death upon the Italian team, she was really egging them on.

You may have noticed I put the personal pronouns (I, you, he, she, it) back on the Italian side above. There's a reason for that:
<>
Subject PronounsUnstressed Indirect Object Pronouns
iomi
tuti
luigli
leile
LeiLe
noici
voivi
lorogli

"Unstressed Indirect Object Pronouns" just spells "fun", right? I'm honestly trying to make this as painless as possible. Don't worry about the "Unstressed" part anyway. And for what it's worth, German, Koine Greek and (if I'm not mistaken) Latin are far worse when it comes to this part of grammar.

It's called case. Italian here is a bit like English in that you don't usually have to worry about case, but you do when it comes to pronouns. Have another table:
Ime
youyou
hehim
sheher
itit
weus
theythem

That's essentially the English equivalent of the above. With any luck it'll make what I'm about to say make a little more sense. Take a look at this:

'He threw it to us.'

Who's doing the throwing? - He is.
What's being thrown? - It is.
Who's it being thrown to? - To us.

The first is called the subject - it's the thing or person that performs the action of the verb.
The second is a direct object - it's the thing that the verb is acting on.
The third is an indirect object - there isn't a direct connection to the action of the verb itself.

Each takes into account the function of the word within the sentence, and if you get it wrong you sound like a caveman:

'Him threw it to we.'

It's the same deal with Italian. 'we' would be translated 'noi', and 'to us' would be translated 'ci'

So, you put 'da'!' and 'ci' together, and you (finally) get 'dacci' - 'give us'

oggi

'oggi' means 'today'.

quotidiano

'quotidiano' means 'quotidian'.

1 comment:

Paolo Padrini said...

I'd like to offer this story on my application that brings the prayer on iPhone.
I believe that prayer is Christian and Catholic from spreading. You wonder why you can publish the news and if you can spread it to your friends on your blog. And if you download application, you also can rewiev tha app on itunes store, thank's.

thanks

fr. Paolo Padrini

Vatican. iBreviary: Church pray with iPhone

Dear Sirs,
Editing and Friends of iBreviary,

iBreviary, as you know, it's a new application for iPhone,
available from immediately in Spanish, French, English, Latin and Italian.
iBreviary offers the possibility, in a simple way and in a perfect "Apple
style", to pray in mobility with the prayer of the Breviary.
It offers besides the readings of the Mass of the Day (Missal), as well as the
principal Catholic prayers.
The application, realized by me together with the technician and
developer Dimitri Giani, has got the applause and the encouragement
of the Vatican.

iBreviary has now reached its third updating.
This updating brings important changes:
- available application in version Italian and English
- available readings in English, French, Spanish, Latin and in Ambrosian Rite
- possibility to pray with the Compieta of the previous day

The application is available inside the app store to the price of
support for the developers of 0,79 cents (Euro), destinate to charity (www.dimix.it/ibreviary)

Besides, also Facebook will have his "digital Breviary". Its name is
"Praybook" and it's an available application on the most important social
network of the world.
The application allows to pray on line with the same prayers of iBreviary.

Thanks for everything.

father Paolo Padrini
www.dimix.it/ibreviary

http://www.americamagazine.org/blog/entry.cfm?blog_id=2&id=B229A854-1321-AEAA-D3C7465D8C8B5E1C