Parola del Giorno #1 – Montone

Learning a language can be very dull and extremely tedious at times. Verb conjugations, vocab flashcards, ordinal numbers, tense agreement, intonation, pronunciation, definite and indefinite articles…I’m actually falling asleep right now as I type. But every once in a while you have an “ah ha” moment where you piece something together and it makes perfect sense. I adore the Italian language for this reason – my “ah ha” moments are regular. The grammar is more complicated than English, but it also makes more sense.

Today I learned something new and proceeded to have a “ha ha” moment instead of an “ah ha” moment. I would like to share the Italian word of the day (hopefully more to come):

Montone: ram, a male sheep

On the surface, a seemingly simple and uninteresting vocabulary word. But my 60+ year old student (a doctor) informed me of the origin of the word today and I just about lost it.

Montone comes from the verb “montare” which means “to mount.” So what is the word for a male sheep?  A montone – one who mounts a lot of female sheep. Classic.