Four consecutive ambiguous words


Translating the following sentence: ‘ce fait est unique’ is not as easy as it could seem at first glance. In effect, it is made up of four consecutive ambiguous words:

  • ‘ce’: ‘ssu (demonstrative pronoun, this) or ciò (it, relative pronoun)
  • ‘fait’: fattu (masculine singular noun, fact), fattu (past participe, done) or faci (does, third person singular of the verb to do at the present tense)
  • ‘est’: estu (masculine singular noun, east) or (is, third person singular of the verb to be at the present tense)
  • ‘unique’: unicu (masculine singular adjective, unique in English) or unica (feminine singular adjective, unique in English)