European Railroad Discussion > If you're traveling to Italy...

My trusty (and yellowed) Zingarelli dictionary has wonderful illustrations with vocabulary words. Here are two pages devoted to railroad terms. 

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Thanks for posting. For my Intro to Railway Engineering class one of the tangents (groan) I wanted to take my students on was what switch frogs are called in other languages, mainly Spanish. "Rana," or something else? I can't tell from this whether the best lead for Italian is to #4 or #11. I'm off to Google Translate to see if it helps. BTW, the most authoritative source says English railways use of "frog" comes from a pattern on the bottom of horses hooves, not the amphibian. But where does THAT term come from?
Glen Matteson
San Luis Obispo, California

I'm guessing the second one.
 

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mile250 Wrote:
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> Thanks for posting. For my Intro to Railway
> Engineering class one of the tangents (groan) I
> wanted to take my students on was what switch
> frogs are called in other languages, mainly
> Spanish. "Rana," or something else? I can't tell
> from this whether the best lead for Italian is to
> #4 or #11. I'm off to Google Translate to see if
> it helps. BTW, the most authoritative source says
> English railways use of "frog" comes from a
> pattern on the bottom of horses hooves, not the
> amphibian. But where does THAT term come from?
> Glen Matteson
> San Luis Obispo, California

In German, “frog” is “Herzstück”, or literally “heart piece”.

Posted from iPhone

Thanks. So the Italian "cuore" must be the closest. 

Interesting discussion. I've been traveling for the past two days so did not have access to my dictionary.

Yes, the Italian word for frog is cuore. What's also interesting is that the guard rail at the frog is called zampa di lepre, "hare's paw [rail]." The guard rail opposite the frog is simply called controrotaia, or "counter-rail."

 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/21/19 11:07 by colehour.