dolenti note
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Italian[edit]
Etymology[edit]
Literally, “the doleful notes”. From Dante's La Divina Commedia (see the quotation below). First attested in 1472.
Noun[edit]
dolenti note f pl (plural only)
- (almost always preceded by le) screams of the condemned in hell
- 2000 [1472], Dante Alighieri, “Inferno”, in Robert Hollander, Jean Hollander, transl., La Divina Commedia [The Divine Comedy], Doubleday:
- Or incomincian le dolenti note / a farmisi sentire; or son venuto / là dove molto pianto mi percuote.
- Now I can hear the screams / of agony; now I have come where a great wailing beats upon me.
- (figurative, by extension) sad facts or events; things said on a sad note; bad news