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L'Orario: Telling Time in Italian

There are two common ways to ask for the time in Italian: "Che ora è?" and "Che ore sono?". When responding, the forms "è" and "sono" are used but are not interchangeable. "È" is used for noon, midnight, and 1:00, while "sono" is used otherwise. Time is expressed with the definite article "le" in front of the hour words. Partial hours are indicated using "e" between the hour and minutes. Half and quarter hours can also be expressed in Italian similar to English.

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356 views9 pages

L'Orario: Telling Time in Italian

There are two common ways to ask for the time in Italian: "Che ora è?" and "Che ore sono?". When responding, the forms "è" and "sono" are used but are not interchangeable. "È" is used for noon, midnight, and 1:00, while "sono" is used otherwise. Time is expressed with the definite article "le" in front of the hour words. Partial hours are indicated using "e" between the hour and minutes. Half and quarter hours can also be expressed in Italian similar to English.

Uploaded by

AndreaLibonik
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PPT, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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LOrario

Telling Time in Italian



In Italian there are two ways of asking the
time:
Che ora ?
or
Che ore sono?

They both have the same meaning;
although it is more common to use the
second form.

When answering the question, there are
two forms used: and sono. These are
not interchangeable.
One uses is used with the following
times:
Noon mezzogiorno.
Midnight mezzanotte.
One oclock luna.**

** is used with 1:00 only until 1:30.
When expressing time in Italian, the
definite article le is used in front of
the hour.
It is used because the Italian word for
hour, lora, is feminine and when
expressing plural hours, it becomes
le ore.
When expressing time that is not on the
dot of an hour, we use the word e
between the hour and minutes:

Sono le due e dieci. 2:10

Sono le sette e venti. 7:20

Sono le undici e tredici. 11:13

Halves and Quarters

In English, there are two ways to express
half past an hour. We can say for
example that it is three thirty or we can
say it is half past three.
In Italian, it is the same. One may say:
Sono le tre e trenta.
or
Sono le tre e mezzo.
When expressing either quarter past or
quarter of an hour, it can be expressed
just as in English as well.

4:15
Sono le quattro e quindici.
Sono le quattro e un quarto.

5: 45
Sono le cinque e quarantacinque.
Sono le cinque e tre quarti.
Time of Day:
In Europe AM and PM are used in
general telling of time.
However, when reading time tables
for airplanes, trains, museums,
and other schedules, they are
still printed using the 24 hour
clock.
In conversation, however, time of
day is expressed as seen below:
A.M.
di (della) mattina in the morning
P.M.
di (del) pomeriggio in the
afternoon
di (della) sera in the evening
di (della) notte at night

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