/salˈtare di ˈpalo in ˈfraska/ lit. ‘to jump from pole to leafy branch’
Italian idiom, everyday. To jump suddenly from one topic to a completely unrelated one.
Draft Not yet checked by a native Italian speaker.
How do people use Saltare di palo in frasca
?
Everyday Italian, used for someone whose talk hops around without warning, and just as often about yourself (“scusate, salto di palo in frasca, ma...”). It conjugates normally: “salta di palo in frasca”, “è saltato di palo in frasca”. It’s usually a mild complaint about rambling, the way Treccani puts it: switching topic suddenly and mostly without any logic.
Also said saltar di palo in frasca
Saltare di palo in frasca
in real sentences
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Non saltare di palo in frasca!
Don’t keep jumping from one topic to another!
Tatoeba, sentence by Guybrush88, CC BY 2.0 FR
Where does Saltare di palo in frasca
come from?
Treccani lists it under frasca (a leafy branch) and quotes Alessandro Manzoni using “saltar di palo in frasca”, so it was established Italian by the 19th century. The picture seems to be a bird hopping from a bare pole to a branch for no obvious reason, but that’s a reading of the image, not a documented origin. English Wiktionary compares it with the French “sauter du coq à l’âne”, and we found no record of when the Italian phrase first appeared.
Mistakes learners make with Saltare di palo in frasca
Swapping the pieces around. It’s always “di palo in frasca”, never “dal palo alla frasca” or “di frasca in palo”, and it’s about talk or thought, so don’t use it for someone physically moving from place to place.
Other Italian idioms like Saltare di palo in frasca
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