Dainos: la traduzione italiana dei canti popolari lituani

Dainos: the Italian translation of Lithuanian folk songs – This essay presents the first and unique Italian translation of an anthology of Lithuanian folk songs: Canti popolari lituani by Giuseppe Morici. Already published in 1925 (A.R.E., Roma), in 1930 the collection was republished as part of an editorial series – Poesia popolare indoeuropea – dedicated to the tradition of Indo-European folk poetry and edited by Ettore Lo Gatto. The essay is divided into two parts. The first one analyses Morici’s anthology considering its structure and contents, as well as the historical and cultural context in which it was set. The second part focuses on some textual samples indicative of the translation difficulties Morici faced due to structural and semantic differences between the Lithuanian and the Italian languages