The Renaissance #24 / “Let’s roll!”

Buondì.

They say there’s nothing new under the sun, and reading today’s episode from our Summer Series on the Renaissance (and the following century or two), I was reminded of that.

We’re in the middle of the eighteenth century now, in Genova, where the locals are fed up with being bossed about by Austrian queens, so to speak.

The rebels man and perhaps woman their barricades, clutching whatever weapons they can lay their hands on.

The rows of Austrian troops approach.

Then… silence.

An impatient (or heroic, depending on your point of view) Genovese youth yells out the dialect equivalent of ‘Let’s roll!” and shoots off a stone from his sling, hitting an unfortunate Austrian conscript and starting the battle.

Find out how to say that in eighteenth-century Genovese, which side came out on top, and how the pugnacious teenager’s example subsequently inspired a Fascist-era youth movement, in today’s simplified article with online audio:

Il Rinascimento, Episodio 23. Maria Teresa d’Austria e gli Asburgo nel nord Italia (seconda metà del XVIII secolo)

There’s a link to a video at the end. It’s five minutes long and the voice-over is in ‘authentic’ (so fast and complex) Italian, which will make it a challenge for all but the most advanced learners.

Nevertheless, it’s worth a look-see. You’ll anyway get a good idea just from the visuals, and who knows, perhaps you’ll understand more of the audio than you’d expect?

N.b. The previous twenty-three articles in this series, along with the entire Summer Series from 2020 and 2021, are linked to from our History page.

A lunedì!

P.S.

Thursday’s FREE bulletin of ‘easy’ Italian news was published yesterday.

Don’t let it go to waste!

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