Some Italian words have a similar sound as their English counterpart. Many people assume this also means they have the same meaning, but this often isn't the case. We call these words false friends, of ‘falsi amici’ in Italian. Because they tend to cause issues in communication, this page is all about this particular phenomenon. We'll start with an explanation, followed by an overview of false friends. To make it all a little easier to understand, we've also included a number of example sentences with falsi amici.
False friends, Italian and English
What are false friends? We get this question a lot. So before we dive into the examples, we'll start with a brief explanation. We use the term ‘falsi amici’ for Italian words that resemble English words in terms of sound, spelling or form, but have a different meaning. This is something to keep in mind when learning Italian. If you don't, an Italian may not understand you when you're communicating.
In order to explain exactly what ‘falsi amici’ are, we will use the Italian word ‘papa’ as an example. Because this word is written the same way as in English, you might think it has the same meaning. This is not the case, however. When an Italian says ‘papa’, they are talking about the pope. The word for father is mostly the same, but the final ‘a’ gets an accent: papà. This also changes the stress on the word, resulting in a different meaning.
Overview of falsi amici
Now you know an Italian word may not have the same meaning as its English counterpart if there's a resemblance in terms of sound, form or spelling. Unfortunately, it happens quite a lot that false friends lead to problems when communicating with Italians. An Italian may not understand you if you use a false friend in a sentence. In order to prevent this from happening, Translation Agency Perfect has created an overview of 30 Italian false friends.
Italian word | Meaning | Falsi amici | Meaning |
---|---|---|---|
attualmente | currently | actually | in realtà |
avvisare | to warn | to advise | consigliare |
caldo | hot | cold | freddo |
cantina | basement | canteen | mensa |
camera | room | photo camera | macchina fotografica |
carta | paper | (greeting) card | cartolina |
casino | brothel | casino | casinò |
compagno | friend | companion | socio |
cocomero | watermelon | cucumber | cetriolo |
dirigente | manager | conductor | direttore d’orchestra |
educato | polite | educated | istruito |
fame | hunger | fame (bedrijf) | celebrità |
firma | signature | firm (company) | ditta |
lampo | lightning (flash) | lamp | lampada |
morbido | soft | morbid | macabro |
mosca | fly | mosquito | zanzara |
mostarda | chutney with fruit | mustard | senape |
mostra | show | monster | mostro |
notizia | massage | note | appunto |
papa | pope | papa (father) | papà |
parenti | family members | parents | genitori |
patente | driving licence | patent | brevetto |
preservativo | condom | preservative | conservante |
prima | first | prime | benissimo |
puzzare | to stink | to clean | pulire |
sensibile | sensitive | sensible | ragionevole |
spada | sword | spade/shovel | pala |
sporta | grocery bag | sport | sport |
tradurre | to translate | to trade | commerciare |
tonno | tonijn | ton/vat | botte/barile |
Examples of falsi amici
Did you study the list? Then you will know a large number of falsi amici. In order to show you what false friends look like in an Italian sentence, the native speakers of our Italian translation agency have created a number of examples.
Il mio compagno da dieci anni.
Sounds like: He's been my companion for ten years.
Means: He's been my friend/partner for ten years.
Proper Italian: Il mio socio da dieci anni