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Specializes in:
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Italian to English - Standard rate: 0.07 EUR per word / 30 EUR per hour
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Source text - Italian Candia Veneziana - Agios Costantinos
A due chilometri da Agios Costantinos, in localita' San Constantino di Buzonaria, esiste ancora la fonte Barozzi, che troviamo con l'aiuto di due anziani signori che interpelliamo al kafeneion della piazza del paese e che si
offrono di accompagnarci. Appena dopo il paese a sinistra della strada che conduce a Roustika', imbocchiamo un viottolo
piuttosto malconcio per la pioggia recente e dalle pietre sconnesse che scende fino a una radura verdissima e
lussureggiante di mirti e allori, ombreggiata da un platano gigantesco dai neri, lunghi rami contorti che conferisce
a questo sito un'atmosfera incantata. Le nostre due guide con un filo di nostalgia raccontano che la fonte in estate
era meta di feste e scampagnate e che la radura poteva contenere fino a duecento persone. Una foto dei primi del
Novecento la ritrae in una cornice rigogliosa di platani e castagni; prima ancora, Sir Robert Pashley nei suoi
Travels della prima meta' dell'Ottocento la descrive cosi': "Fonte copiosa di acque sotto due platani secolari [...] all'estremita' di una piccola valle, piena di cipressi, allori, alberi d'arancio, carubbi, platani e
mirto" e, dopo aver rimosso muschio e felci dalla fontana, riesce a trascriverne l'iscrizione datata 1509:
FRANCISCUS BAROCIVS IACOPI FILIUS
PROPTER PARENTUM ET AMICORUM SUORUM ANIMI RECREATIONE(M)
LOCUM HUNC PERORNAVIT. MDIX
(Francesco Barozzi, figlio di Giacomo,
per ricreare i suoi familiari e amici,
adorno' questo luogo. 1509).
e resta tanto affascinato dal sito da citare alcuni versi dell'Armonia di Torquato Tasso (vv. 8-11),
“Se non disdegni il seggio ombroso, e ’l monte, e ’l dolce mormorar del chiaro fonte,
qui siedi, e spazia tra i bei fiori e l’erba,
nella stagione acerba.”
Non possiamo che essere d'accordo, anche se l'iscrizione non esiste piu' (forse il muschio l'ha ricoperta)
e il posto e' oggi piuttosto trascurato, senza un cartello che lo indichi.
Anche il vicino villaggio di Roustikà, distante poco piu' di un chilometro, ha case antiche e resti
di mura molto suggestivi, ma per una volta qui non cerchiamo dimore veneziane, bensi' un campanile che
fa parte della chiesa del convento di Sant'Elia Profeta (profitis Ilias), appena fuori del paese
in direzione Moundros. Il calogeros del convento ci accoglie e possiamo cosi' ammirare questo bel campanile
di pietra con la data 1644 e il nome dell'abate Metrofanio Vlastò Marcomanolopulo. Le tre campane di bronzo portano
incise, secondo l'uso dell'epoca, rispettivamente le figurette della Madonna, di san Giorgio e ancora una Madonna
con una targhetta che reca il nome del fabbro milanese e le date 1634 e 1636:
SANTINUS DE REGIS MEDIOLANE(N)SI(S) F. OPUS.
(Santino De Regis, milanese, fece quest'opera.)
Ma la meta piu' interessante dell'itinerario e' senz'altro Argiroupolis che raggiungiamo percorrendo una strada
tra olivi antichi e come sfondo il monte Azonas. Il paese, in bella posizione collinare tra aranceti, era il sito
dell'antica citta' di Lappa. Esso e' diviso in due parti: in quella bassa si trovano delle cascate d'acqua e notevoli
resti romani; in quella alta e' chiara l'impronta veneziana. Ed e' quest'ultima parte che visitiamo, percorrendo, dopo
essere passati soto un arco, una via che, in un tragitto circolare, ci fa scoprire molte casupole antiche con belle
contornate e graziose scale esterne che probabilmente si radunavano attorno alla grande villa veneziana della famiglia
Clodio. Di questa, che era costruita su resti romani, restano delle finestre in rovina e uno stupendo portale del
Cinquecento, ben tenuto, di forma rettangolare fiancheggiato da due colonne poligonali dai capitelli gotici.
Sull'architrave, una scritta in latino, un'aforisma morale che sembra sintetizzare l'ascesa e la caduta di
Venezia:
OMNIA MUNDI FUMUS ET UMBRA
(Tutto del mondo e' fumo e ombra)
Prima di far ritorno a Retimo, facciamo una sosta a Episkopi', puntando verso il centro storico di
questo grande borgo agricolo. Attorno alla cattedrale si trovano molte case antiche di pietra con cantonate e
porte sormontate da architravi sostenute da mensoline interne. In particolare siamo attratti da due bei
portoni veneziani che restano a testimonianza di antiche dimore veneziane e, in un punto molto panoramico,
appena sotto la chiesa principale che spazia sulla valle, si erge un palazzotto di pietra intonacato di giallo
ocra che rivela nei tre avvolti tutte le caratteristiche architettoniche della tipica casa del signorotto di campagna dell'epoca veneziana.
Siamo al nostro secondo giorno di visita e, lasciata Retimo, ci dirigiamo verso Agios Georgios, che si
trova appena fuori il grande paese di Armeni e che Gerola ci descrive come ricco di case con porte bugnate
e massicce finestre, feudo di un nobile veneziano. Il paesino, o piuttosto la frazione, si rivela un
agglomerato di casette ristrutturate e imbiancate, con orti profumati e ben tenuti: il tipo di abitazione
"rurale" che i cretesi, costretti a vivere e lavorare nelle citta', tanto amano.
Solo nella parte piu' alta di Agios Georgios scorgiamo i resti di quello che doveva essere stato un palazzo
signorile a due piani con finestre modanate e, nel cortile incolto, due grandi portoni simili a quelli
visti a Moundros. Tutt'intorno, i muri a secco rivelano lo stile veneziano negli angoli solidi e
ben rifiniti.
Restiamo piu' soddisfatti dalla visita di Fotinos, a quattro chilometri di distanza, paese immerso in un
paesaggio collinare di castagni che premia la nostra fatica con una fontana del Seicento, oggi disseccata, ma
dalla bella fronte in pietra ornata da una colonna scanalata e con tutt'intorno bassorilievi di foglie,
rosette e ghirlande.
Testo di Michele Buonsanti e Alberta Galla.
Candia Veneziana (2005)
Translation - English Candia Veneziana - Agios Costantinos
The Barozzi fountain stills exists and is located just two kilometres outside Agios Costantinos, at San Constantino di Buzonaria. We manage to locate it with the help of two old gentlemen whom we met
in the kafeneionin the village square.
Just outside the town, to the left of the road that leads to Roustikà, we go along a country track that’s still in fairly poor condition on account of the recent downpour and is strewn with rocks here and there. We soon come to a very green, open area full of myrtle and laurel bushes beneath a gigantic plane tree with long, dark, twisted boughs that create a sort of enchanted atmosphere.
Revealing a slight feeling of nostalgia, our two guides say that the water fountain was once the place where local
people would gather for parties and excursions in the summertime and that there was room for up to two hundred
people at this little spot. A photograph taken in the early 1900s shows the fountain surrounded by plants, and
chestnut and plane trees.
Much earlier, describing this very same site in his Travels in Crete, which was published in the 1830s, Sir Robert Pashley says that at the end of a small valley filled with cypress, orange, bay laurel, carob, myrtle
and plane trees there was a spring from which water gushed out beneath two plane trees that were hundreds of years old […].
Pashley tells us that he removed the ferns and moss that covered the fountain and was able to record the Latin inscription dated 1509:
FRANCISCUS BAROCIVS IACOPI FILIUS
PROPTER PARENTUM ET AMICORUM SUORUM ANIMI RECREATIONE(M) LOCUM HUNC PERORNAVIT. MDIX
(For the sake of reviving the spirits of his relatives and friends, Francesco Barozzi, the son of James, elegantly adorned this site in the year 1509).
Pashley was so enchanted by the site he decided to add to that section of his work a few lines from Torquato Tasso’s Armonia(lines 8-11)
“Se non disdegni il seggio ombroso, e ’l monte, e ’l dolce mormorar del chiaro fonte,
qui siedi, e spazia tra i bei fiori e l’erba,
nella stagione acerba.”
(If this shady seat doth not displease thee,
nor the hills, nor the sweetly murmuring sounds of a limpid spring,
then sit thyself here,
to gaze out upon the beautiful flowers and across the grass,
in the still unripe season).
and his poetical association is quite apt! However, the inscription no longer exists (or perhaps the moss and ferns have concealed it forever), the place is totally neglected and no signs indicate to travellers
how they can get there.
Just over a kilometre away, the nearby village of Roustika' also conceals many remains of the walls of very
old houses, but for a change we decide not to look for the ruins of Venetian homes and try to locate a bell
tower that was part of the church in the Monastery of St. Elias the Prophet (prophitis Ilias), just
outside the village in the direction of Mundros. In the monastery, a kalogeros (friar) welcomes us and we
are able to view the sturdy tower made of stone, which shows the date 1644 and the name of the abbot,
Metrophanios Vlastò Marcomanolopoulos.
In accordance with an old custom, the three bronze bells are engraved with sacred images:
in this case, of the Holy Virgin, St. George and, again, on the third bell, another representation of the
Holy Virgin. The bells have a small plate attached to them showing the name of a Milanese bell-maker and the
dates 1634 and 1636:
SANTINUS DE REGIS MEDIOLANE(N)SI(S) F. OPUS.
(Santinus De Regis of Milan produced this work.)
However, the most interesting place on the entire itinerary is undoubtedly Argiroupolis, which we reach by
driving along a road surrounded by very old olive trees and from which we can see Mount Azonas in the distance.
The village is on a hillside covered with orange groves and stands on the site of the ancient city of Lappa.
It is divided into two parts: in the lower part there some waterfalls and a few ancient Roman remains,
while in the higher part the Venetian influence is quite evident, and this is the part we wish to visit.
We pass through an archway and walk along a street, which, winding in a circular fashion around the village,
allows us to discover a lot of small, old houses, with attractive surrounds and elegant external stairways,
which were probably grouped around the large Venetian villa of the Clodio family. In this villa, which was
built on the remains of Roman buildings, there are still some tall, ruined windows and a stupendous,
rectangular, well-preserved portal of the 16th century flanked by two polygonal columns with Gothic capitals.
On the architrave we notice a Latin inscription: an aphorism which for a moment reminded us of the rise and
fall of the Most Serene Republic itself:
OMNIA MUNDI FUMUS ET UMBRA
(All earthly things are nought but shade and darkness)
This is the second day of our visit and, after leaving Rethymnon, we travel on to Agios Georgios, which is
just outside Armeni. The town - once the fief of a Venetian noble - is described by Gerola as being
full of houses with rusticated doorways and very solid windows. Agios Georgios is just a group of small,
restored, whitewashed houses with fragrant, well-kept gardens: the kind of ‘rural’ dwellings that the Cretans
who are obliged to live in the cities love so much. Only in the upper part of the town is it possible to see
the remains of what must have been an elegant, two-floor palazzo with moulded windows and, in a
poorly-maintained courtyard, two large portals similar to those seen at Mundros. The surrounding, bare stone
walls reveal the Venetian style in their solid, well-finished quoins.
We get more satisfaction out of our visit to Fotinos, four kilometres after Agios Georgios, a village immersed
in a hilly landscape filled with chestnut trees. Here our efforts are rewarded as we find a 16th-century fountain.
Now completely dried up, the water fountain has handsome facing in stone decorated with a fluted column and
bas-relief motifs including leaves, roses and garlands.
Text by Michele Buonsanti e Alberta Galla
Candia Veneziana - Itinerari di viaggio nella memoria storica di Creta.
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Translation education
Graduate diploma - Final Diploma, Chartered Institute of Linguists (London), 1989
Experience
Years of experience: 38. Registered at ProZ.com: Sep 1999. Became a member: May 2011.
I have been translating a wide range of texts since 1986, when I gradually began to reduce my commitments as a 'TEFL' English language teacher. I had occasionally been involved in translation projects even before this time (from 1973).
As a 'specialist', over the years I have acquired familiarity with certain fields; in particular I have translated many legal texts (attorneys' memoranda, legal defence, writs of summons, court sentences, notarial deeds, public laws, etc).
Other projects have involved the translation of government documents (Italian Chamber of Deputies, Ministries and government departments and commissions), commercial/business texts (contracts, agreements, Chamber of Commerce certification etc), patents and quality control reports.
In 2012 I was included in the EPSO database of eligible candidates following a selection procedure based on competency tests for the FR>EN and IT>EN linguistic combinations
For many years I collaborated with the Pentastudio Marketing Agency (Vicenza) as translator, proof-reader and adviser for marketing materials and advertising in English. Most of the texts I translated for this firm, such as those written for Eutelsat (the European Intergovernmental Organisation for satellite communications) and the Vicenza Trade Fair Board, were used in publications distributed worldwide.
1992 - Subcontractor for translation service (API)
Apart from other commitments, for a period of about 12 months (1992) I was a sub-contractor for the Vicenza branch of the Italian A.P.I. (Associazione Piccole e Medie Industrie), for which I managed a small translation service.
1997 - EU subcontractor
Towards the end of the 1990s I was included in the lists of external freelance translators of the European Commission.
Main areas of specialisation:
Advertising and public relations
Architecture
Arts and humanities
Business / Commerce (general)
(administration, general, management, quality control and certification, marketing and commercial contracts)
Diplomas, certificates, public records, personal documents
Ecology and environment
Education / pedagogy
European Union
Globalisation
General
Government / politics / ministerial documentation
Human resources
Legal (general)
(court sentences, writs of summons, legal defence and memoranda, notarial deeds and certificates, national laws)
Management
Marketing / Market research
Notarial deeds
Psychometrics, clinical psychology, psychiatry
Other areas:
Banking documents
Broadcasting and journalism
General
History
History of architecture
Literary
Medical (mainly psychiatry)
Philosophy
Psychology (clinical and general)
Religion
Social sciences (anthropology, communication, political science, welfare)
Tourism and travel
Technical:
- welding technology,
- die-casting equipment
- electric pumps,
- RFID (radio-frequency) library sensors
- ovens for bakeries,
- leather industry (tanneries),
- transformers
- aeronautical (gliders)
- heating plants and systems
- patents
Keywords: Italian to english translator and editor, government, legal and notarial texts, business contracts, tourism, history of art, education, sociology, technical translations, clinical psychology. See more.Italian to english translator and editor, government, legal and notarial texts, business contracts, tourism, history of art, education, sociology, technical translations, clinical psychology, psychometrics, psychiatry, social sciences, sociology. See less.
Member since May '11
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