European Soccer Championship – Grand Final – Italy v Spain!

As I write this, we are watching the European Championships.  In the time it has taken me to download the photos and load them onto the blog, the first half has finished and Italy is down 0-2 to Spain.

There are thousands of people outside our front door watching the game on the giant screen down on ‘The Beach’ along the river but we are watching the game in the comfort of our air-conditioned lounge which considering it is 32 degrees Celsius outside (10pm) is not a bad option.  Being new (and responsible) parents does have it’s advantages.

Hopefully I’ll be able to add a positive note at the end of this post but while we wait for the second half to start,  you can enjoy the photos…………..

And for those wanting to know the words and translation of the Italian anthem, thanks to Wikipedia here they are :

Il Canto degli Italiani (The Song of the Italians)

Fratelli d’Italia,

l’Italia s’è desta,

dell’elmo di Scipio

s’è cinta la testa.

Dov’è la Vittoria?

Le porga la chioma,

ché schiava di Roma

Iddio la creò.

Fratelli d’Italia,

l’Italia s’è desta,

dell’elmo di Scipio

s’è cinta la testa.

Dov’è la Vittoria?

Le porga la chioma,

ché schiava di Roma

Iddio la creò.

Stringiamci a coorte,

siam pronti alla morte.

Siam pronti alla morte,

l’Italia chiamò.

Stringiamci a coorte,

siam pronti alla morte.

Siam pronti alla morte,

l’Italia chiamò, sì!

English translation

Brothers of Italy,

Italy has awoken,

Bound Scipio’s helmet

Upon her head.

Where is Victory?

Let her offer her locks to [Italy],

Slave of Rome

For God created her.

Brothers of Italy,

Italy has awoken,

Bound Scipio’s helmet

Upon her head.

Where is Victory?

Let her offer her locks to [Italy] ,

Slave of Rome.

For God created her.

Let us join in a cohort,

We are ready to die.

We are ready to die,

Italy has called.

Let us join in a cohort,

We are ready to die.

We are ready to die,

Italy has called, yes!

Il Canto degli Italiani (The Song of the Italians) is the Italian national anthem. It is best known among Italians as Inno di Mameli (Mameli’s Hymn), after the author of the lyrics, or Fratelli d’Italia (Brothers of Italy), from its opening line. The words were written in the autumn of 1847 in Genoa, by the then 20-year-old student and patriot Goffredo Mameli, in a climate of popular struggle for unification and independence of Italy which foreshadowed the war against Austria. Two months later, they were set to music in Turin by another Genoese, Michele Novaro.  The hymn enjoyed widespread popularity throughout the period of the Risorgimento and in the following decades.

After unification (1861) the adopted national anthem was the Marcia Reale, the Royal March (or Fanfara Reale), official hymn of the royal house of Savoy composed in 1831 to order of Carlo Alberto di Savoia. The Marcia Reale remained the Italian national anthem until Italy became a republic in 1946.

Giuseppe Verdi, in his Inno delle Nazioni (Hymn of the Nations), composed for the London International Exhibition of 1862, chose Il Canto degli Italiani – and not the Marcia Reale – to represent Italy, putting it beside God Save the Queen and the Marseillaise.

In 1946 Italy became a republic, and on October 12, 1946, Il Canto degli Italiani was provisionally chosen as the country’s new national anthem. This choice was made official in law only on November 17, 2005, almost 60 years later.