There is a TV show currently in USA that has two hosts, an Italian, and an American of Italian ancestry who (apparently) can speak Italian. Every episode at least once includes the phrase "capo di casa." Is that an error or a legitimate Italian expression? Why is it not "capo della casa"?
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1Who/what are they referring to as capo di/della casa?– DaGMay 18 at 8:14
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These American chefs are competing to become the “capo di casa”– WGroleauMay 18 at 13:25
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2 Answers
'Capo di casa' and 'capo della casa' express the same concept. They only interposed a simple preposition (capo di casa) and an articulated one (capo della casa). it is therefore not an error and can be considered a legitimate sentence.
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1@WGroleau: No, and that's a quite bizarre conjecture, since de is not a word of modern Italian, and i wouldn't agree with casa.– DaGMay 18 at 19:53
"Capo di casa" is indeed correct, bit it's not something we say in Italy. Over here there are two set phrases: "padrone di casa" which means "master of the house" (un buon padrone di casa = a good master of the house, a good host) and the legal term "capofamiglia", head of the family, the person (man or woman) who is the legal head of a family.
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The context is that the the winner of the cooking competition will be "capo di casa." Does that change your answer?– WGroleauMay 21 at 14:32
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@WGroleau: I agree with the answerer that, while capo di casa is a sequence utterable in Italian, it's not quite idiomatic and, if anything, a bit puzzling. In which sense capo (i.e. “chief”)? Do you give orders to other people? Relatives, servants? I'd wonder.– DaGMay 24 at 10:46
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"Chef" is pretty much French for "chief," and he/she would presumably give orders to others in the kitchen. Is it idiomatic in that context? Alex Guarnaschelli is American, but Gabe Bertaccini was born and raised in Firenze. (But he has been living in Los Angeles for years.)– WGroleauMay 24 at 15:32
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Yes, @WGroleau, French chef and English chief are cognate words, and so is, from farther away, Italian capo (all of them descending from Latin caput, “head”), but capo has nothing to do with cooks and kitchens. One can be a capo of several things: a military unit, an office, a building site, a caravan, even a team of waiters (and much more), but it's not normally used for a kitchen. Perhaps that phrase was born as an in-joke or as a error someone made.– DaGMay 24 at 16:55
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Perhaps. That's basically my question, although it was the 'i' in 'di' that made me incorrectly think masculine plural.– WGroleauMay 24 at 21:40