zingaro
English edit
Etymology edit
From Italian. Doublet of tzigane.
Noun edit
zingaro (plural zingaros or zingari)
- (archaic) A Gypsy.
- 1969, Georges Perec, translated by Gilbert Adair, A Void:
- Sporting a woolly cardigan with four buttons on top of an Oxford smock without a collar, our man has a faintly folksy look about him, calling to mind a zingaro or a gypsy, a carny or a Mongol, but also (switching to a wholly distinct mythology and iconography) a hippy strumming his guitar in a barroom in Haight-Ashbury or at Big Sur or in Katmandu.
Related terms edit
Anagrams edit
French edit
Pronunciation edit
Adjective edit
zingaro (plural zingaros)
Further reading edit
- “zingaro”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.
Italian edit
Alternative forms edit
Etymology edit
Dissimilated form of earlier zingano, most likely from a Greek term meaning "untouchable". Compare the modern Greek designations Τσιγγάνοι (Tsingánoi), Αθίγγανοι (Athínganoi), τσιγγάνος (tsingános).[1][2][3] Cognate to German Zigeuner.
Pronunciation edit
Noun edit
zingaro m (plural zingari, feminine zingara)
- Gypsy, Roma
- 1975, “Rimmel”, in Rimmel, performed by Francesco De Gregori:
- Chi mi ha fatto le carte / mi ha chiamato vincente / ma uno zingaro, è un trucco.
- (please add an English translation of this quotation)
- (offensive) a scruffy or slovenly person
- tinker
- (figuratively) a person who likes to travel, who cannot stay a long time in one place
- 1971, “Il cuore è uno zingaro”, performed by Nicola Di Bari:
- Catene non ha, / il cuore è uno zingaro e va.
- It has no chains, / the heart is a Gypsy and goes away.
Adjective edit
zingaro (feminine zingara, masculine plural zingari, feminine plural zingare)
References edit
- ^ 2004, Viorel Achim, The Roma in Romanian History (Bucharest), page 9
- ^ 2007, Jean-Pierre Liégeois, Roma In Europe, page 17
- ^ 1993, Struggling for Ethnic Identity: The Gypsies of Hungary (published by Human Rights Watch), page 1
- ^ zingaro in Luciano Canepari, Dizionario di Pronuncia Italiana (DiPI)