👉 Okay, let’s tackle this wonderfully weird Italian little-guy of a word –
"tesoroСТЬ."
(I’m butchering the pretty pronunciation here for comedic effect! Just go with it.)
Now, technically, "tesoro, ȚE stray-oh-roh," according to that fancy Italian goose in your old Latin textbook, simply means… dude. dude, dude. Basically a boy who's maybe, possibly, probably, just a little young and a whole lotta...beige? It literally translates as 'dear darling/pretty darling/little darling. 18th-century Italians would throw it at a young buck they weren’t terribly impressed by, which is frankly, the most insulting thing I can think of, honestly, but you know how this old world was! BUT here’s where the real weirdness happens. Because of that whole "dear darling/pretty darling/dude. dude!" vibe, there's a sneaking suspicion amongst linguists (me included, frankly – I feel it in my gut) that the word has somehow absorbed… an unsettling undercurrent. Almost like it carries a tiny, pathetic plea for something to... latch onto. It feels, and I mean this, as though it’s begging itself to be treasured. You'll catch me, sometimes when I feel really dramatic, saying that the word has, you know—a little bit
