Imagine that, during a dinner with friends, someone makes a bad joke and another person, to avoid embarrassment, changes the subject by saying: “Sorry, I didn’t hear well, what were we talking about?”, pretending not to have understood the joke. In this case, we could say that the person is “playing dumb“. This expression, in fact, is often used in colloquial Italian language to describe someone who pretends not to know or understand something.
“Ignori” is a masculine noun that has taken hold in common language to indicate a person who behaves in deliberately ignorant manner. This behavior does not necessarily imply true ignorance, but rather its simulation.
L’origin the term “gnòrri” derives from the verb “ignore“, as reported by the Treccani dictionary. The expression “fare lo gnòrri” means, precisely, fake of not knowing or not understanding. This behavior can be motivated by various factors, such as avoiding responsibility, escaping from uncomfortable situations, or obtaining an advantage in a given circumstance.
Etymologically, there are two most plausible hypotheses to reconstruct the origin of the expression “fare lo gnorri”, both linked to the verb “ignore”. The first hypothesis suggests that “gnorri” derives from “Ignore“an ancient Tuscan adjective for “ignorant”, with expressive doubling of the –r– intervocalic and the –the typical ending of many surnames. This adjective comes from the first person of the present indicative of “ignorare” ((I) ignore), with the dropping of the initial vowel, and is already attested in Benvenuto Cellini:
«Make that benign star victorious, which has raised me from the ignorance of the common people».
The second hypothesis instead proposes a direct derivation of “Ignorant“ from the second person of the present indicative of “ignorare” ((you) ignore), with the dropping of the initial vowel and expressive doubling of the –r– intervocalic.
The use of “fare lo gnòrri” is frequent in informal contextswhere the person tries to avoid a direct confrontation or a challenging discussion. ‘Gnorri’ is a personification of ignorance, which is not because he really doesn’t understand something, but because he pretends not to know something he knows very well. Other similar and curious ways of saying things are “to act like an Indian“ or “the nesci“all of which indicate acting like a fool.
