You know that bit in gangster movies when the mobster yells capeesh?!, right before whacking his business partner around the head with a wrench and throwing him in a garbage truck?
As a fan of the Sopranos and Goodfellas, capeesh? was one of the few Italian words Katie knew before she moved to Italy.
But it turns out, it’s not actually Italian!
In this episode, learn how Italians really use the verb capire, (to understand) and some other handy -ire verbs including pulire (to clean) and finire (to finish).
To make sure you remember what you learnt in today's lesson, below you'll find bonus materials including word lists, quizzes and flashcards. But first...
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Bonus Materials
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Today's Italian words
Capisco il francese = I understand French
Ma non lo parlo = But I don’t speak it.
Capisco = I understand
Pulisco = I clean
Finisco = I finish
Perché lo capisci ma non lo parli? = Why do you understand it but you don’t speak it? (literally: why it understand, but not it you speak?)
Capisci = You understand
Pulisci = You clean
Finisci = You finish
Non mi capiscono = They don’t understand me
Capiscono = They understand
Puliscono = They clean
Finiscono = They finish
Capisce = He/she understands; You understand (formal)
Pulisce = He/she cleans; You clean (formal)
Finisce = He/she finishes; You finish (formal)
Capiamo = we understand
Puliamo = we clean
Finiamo = we finish
Capite = you all understand (plural you)
Pulite = you all clean (plural you)
Finite = you all finish (plural you)
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Transcript
Please note, this is not a word for word transcript.
Katie: You know in gangster movies when the mobster yells capeesh?! right before whacking his business partner around the head with a wrench and throwing him in a garbage truck?
As a fan of the Sopranos and Goodfellas, before I moved to Italy, capeesh? - meaning “understand?” - was one of the few Italian words I knew.
But it turns out, it’s not actually Italian!
Learn how Italians really use the verb capire, (to understand) and some other handy -ire verbs including pulire (to clean) and finire (to finish) in episode 43 of 5 Minute Italian.
Ciao a tutti e benvenuti a 5 minute Italian, hi everyone and welcome to 5 minute Italian. I’m Katie…
Matteo: And I’m Matteo. Ciao.
K: And before we start today’s episode, we’ve got a little confession for you.
M: Yes. We’re sorry, but we lied to you.
K: We said that there were 3 groups of verbs in Italian. Verbs which end in -are, verbs which end in -ere and verbs which end in -ire. But there are actually four groups.
M: That’s right, because verbs which end in -ire are split into two groups.
K: That means that when you see a verb which ends in - i - r - e, it could follow the pattern that you learnt in the last few episodes. But it might not. That’s because there’s a different -ire pattern that we haven’t talked about yet.
This pattern is used in verbs like capire, which means “to understand”. First, we’ll listen to a dialogue with this verb, then we’ll talk about how to use it.
M: Capisco il francese, ma non lo parlo.
K: Perché lo capisci ma non lo parli?
M: Perché quando lo parlo, non mi capiscono!
K: So here you heard Matteo say capisco il francese “I understand French”, ma non lo parlo “but I don’t speak it”.
M: Let’s look at capisco, means “I understand”.
K: So for the “I” form, as in “I understand”, instead of removing the -ire and adding “o” like we normally would, we add “isco”. For this reason, we call this group of verbs the “isco” verbs.
M: To say “I understand”, remove the “-ire” from capire and add “-isco”.
K: So how would you say “I don’t understand?”
M: Non capisco
K: And you can see all these words written down in the show notes. Another “-isco” verb is pulire, which means to clean. How would you say “I clean”
M: Pulisco
K: And finire, which means to finish. How would you say “I finish”?
M: Finisco.
K: But how do you know if it’s a normal -ire verb, or one of the -isco verbs? Unfortunately, there is no way to know, you just have to learn them. But it’s not necessary to memorise lists, once you know about the rule, you’ll pick the main ones up because you’ll come across them all the time.
Let’s listen to the rest of the dialogue. After capisco il francese ma non lo parlo, you heard me say:
M: Perché lo capisci ma non lo parli?
K: Why do you understand it, but you don’t speak it?
M: Here, you heard capisci, which means “you understand”.
K: So to get the “you” form, remove the “-ire” and add “isci”. So you understand is:
M: Capisci.
K: And how would you say “you clean?”. The verb is pulire, and we need to remove the -ire and add isci.
M: Pulisci
K: And “you finish?”, from the verb finire?
M: Finisci
K: Next, you heard:
M: Perché quando lo parlo, non mi capiscono!
K: Because when I speak, they don’t understand me. Non mi capiscono means “they don’t understand me” literally, not me, they understand (Italians speak like yoda sometimes!).
M: In this sentence, you heard: “capiscono” which means “they understand”. To get the “they” form, remove the “-ire” and add “-iscono”
K: How would you say “they clean?”
M: Puliscono
K: And “they finish”?
M: Finiscono
K: Alright so to recap, we’ve looked at how to say I understand, which is:
M: Capisco
K: You understand, which is:
M: Capisci
K: And they understand which is:
M: Capiscono
K: There are a couple more to learn. To say “he or she understands” we say:
M: Capisce.
K: And we know we also use the he/she form for the formal you. So you say “do you understand” to someone you don’t know very well, you could say:
M: Capisce?
K: These words sound a bit like something Tony Soprano would say before popping someone off: “capeeesh?”. And before I started learning Italian, I like many people I think, assumed that “capeesh” meant understand in Italian.
M: But it doesn’t. It’s similar, but not the same.
K: It’s difficult to pin down etymologically, but capeesh is an Italo-american word, not an Italian one.
M: It probably comes from the fact that in the southern dialects, we often cut the last vowel from words, so the last syllable in capisce is softer. As many of the immigrants were from the south of Italy, this may have evolved into capeesh. But Italians would never say “capeesh?” like in the films. And if you say it, Italians could get offended because it’s associated with mafia stereotypes.
K: We’ve just got too more forms to learn, the “we” form and the “you all” or “y’all” form, the plural you. And I’ve got some good news, these are regular! Just follow the same system you learnt in episodes 39 and 41. So how would you say “we understand?”
M: Remove the -ire from capire and add -iamo. Capiamo
K: How would you say “we clean”?
M: Remove the -ire from pulire and add -iamo. Puliamo
K: And how would you say “we finish?”
M: Remove the -ire from finire and add -iamo. Finiamo
K: And how would you say “you all” or “y’all understand”?
M: Change the “r” in capire to a “t”. Capite.
K: You all clean?
M: Change the “r” in pulire to a “t”. Pulite
K: You all finish?
M: Change the “r” in finire to a “t”. Finite
K: That’s it from us for today. To help you remember what you learnt in today’s episode, head over to joyoflanguages.com/italianpodcast, and go to episode 43 where you’ll find bonus materials including a quiz, flashcards and transcripts. Ciao for now, see you next time, or as we say in Italian…
Alla prossima!
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