Assistance with Inscription on Tombstone

[sforza]

Attached is a pic of my GGGM's headstone. Since the headstone's over 100 yrs old, the words are not clear, and the photo is focused more on the name at the top than on the inscription on the bottom. The inscription contains three lines, the third of which is almost entirely illegible. I have my own theory as to what says, but was hoping someone with better translation skills and perhaps even familiarity with Italian headstone idioms could clarify. It's interesting that the headstone is in Italian, since she died in the US seven years after immigrating from Palermo. I'm not a routine cemetery goer, so am curious how common it was for Italian immigrants to have Italian language headstones. In her case, it's particularly striking because one of her brothers and several of her Sicilian uncles and cousins, all of whom lived close by to her in Brooklyn, had been in the US since the 1840's and 1850's. Thanks so much.

[liviomoreno]

Fierentina Manganaro
Nata Tomaselli
Nata in Palermo Italy
22 August 1852
Morta
15 February 1903

I tuoi figli ti piangono
perché con te han perduto
quello che (the rest is unreadable)...

[pink67]

I agre with Livio, maybe the last line is

"quello che nella vita è vita"

Laura

[sforza]

I had the same for the first two lines, but now am totally confused. What does "vita è vita" mean (something other than the literal translation of "life is life"?)? How would you translate the entire inscription? My first attempt - something like "Your children cry for you because with you was lost [something]" makes no sense. Thanks again for helping.

[JJ313]

I think it would translate to "Your children will weep with you because they have lost what in life is life."

[liviomoreno]

My 2 cents:

The children are crying because they lost their mother and due to her death they also lost what in life is life.

[acartia]

It was interesting you asked about Italian inscriptions on US cemetery headstones.I can not speak for the US as I live in Western Australia. I also cannot comment on headstones over a hundred years old, but I took a wander down our largest city cemetery this arvo and did a short "random" count on two rows of graves, in of course the Catholic section. There were a total of 87 headstones in the two rows. Now 23 of these were only inscribed in Italian. 10 others with Italian names were all in English, and 54 were only in English as they were non Italian deceased anyhow. I left out a few of non Italian graves with other`s from other European countries in my count. All these graves were from the 1980s. So certainly here at my closest cemetery, it is more likely to find an Italian headstone written in Italian than in English. Of course I would think that many of these were born in Italy. My father who was born in Italy is also buried in this same cemetery, but I put his headstone inscription in English at the time as I cannot speak or write Italian, so it was much easier for all of us to use the only language we know, that being English. John.