A new home for Maltese words: Dizzjunarju.mt goes live

"What does Aquilina say?” has, for years, been a standard phrase for those looking for the correct English translation of a Maltese word or phrase. 

Joseph Aquilina's seminal, six-volume English-Maltese dictionary is now set for some 21st-century competition, thanks to a new project to make authoritative translations available on any mobile device. 

Dizzjunarju.mt is set to become the first national digital dictionary of Maltese and is currently being developed by the Department of Maltese at the University of Malta.

It builds on the work done in the sector over the past decades - including the Aquilina volumes themselves, while remaining abreast of the current use of the language, head of department Adrian Grima told Times of Malta.

It went live on Friday night, and dozens of words are already searchable. The features include a pronunciation tab, definitions in Maltese and English equivalents, grammatical information such as which part of speech the word falls under, its plural, root (għerq) and etymology.

Screenshot: dizzjunarju.mt

The site also provides information about the various meanings of a word, examples based on the natural use of the language, idioms and phrases. For example, while many are familiar with the word pastizz and its formal and disparaging meanings, not many know it is the Maltese word for a side cap or a fedora.

The online dictionary also refers to colloquial phrases that survived generations, even if at times, they make no sense, such as the play with words “twenty, waqagħlek il-penti”, which literally translates to “twenty – your underpants slipped down” and is used to taunt someone who has just said “twenty”.

Users will also be able to look up words not just in Maltese, but also in English, and in some instances, they will also be able to look up phrases, with the dictionary showing results for frisk if one looks for ħassa (frisk bħal ħassa: cool as a cucumber).

The dictionary will, additionally, feature a word of the week, hopefully introducing users to new words they might find useful in their use of the language.

Screenshot: dizzjunarju.mt

The main editors are academics Michael Spagnol and Dwayne Ellul, while Julian ‘Julinu’ Mallia takes care of the site’s artistic direction. The researchers are Bradley Cachia, Daniel Attard, Jean Paul Borg, John Paul Grima and Michela Vella.

Spagnol told Times of Malta the online dictionary will remain a work-in-progress for years, “not only because of the mammoth task of compiling words and their meaning/translation, but also because the Maltese language is continuously evolving”.

“While we are building this national dictionary with the support of experts in lexicography, linguistics, corpus linguistics and information technology, we are not doing this alone.

“This is a national dictionary, so we are very open to people’s suggestions, especially when it comes to colloquialism and alternative words to refer to the same meaning that often depend on where the person was brought up.

“For example, while most refer to a ricotta pastizz as a pastizz tal-irkotta, in Gozo they say pastizz tal-ġobon. Other words, such as trampi are almost exclusively used in one area, in this case Gozo, while the equivalent in Malta is completely different: praspar, teatrini or ċajt.”

The dictionary features a section through which people can send their suggestions to the team.

The team believes the dictionary will be useful for a wide range of people - from native speakers to students of Maltese as a foreign language, teachers and translators, media professionals and researchers.

Grima added that the University of Malta chose to make this resource available to anyone who comes in contact with the language, serving its national duty of making the language accessible to all. 

Times of Malta and dizzjunarju.mt have teamed up, and every week for a limited time, timesofmalta.com will feature a word from the dictionary and publish a short clip highlighting as many colloquial references as possible.