Lament from the Sea, New Method! f2r

[Witch Mountain]

Dear friends, it is also worth noting that "Italy hast fame" is ungrammatical in any time period - it is subject-verb agreement error:

I have (1st person)
Thou hast (2nd person)
He/she/it has or hath (3rd person)

"Italy" would be 3rd person (the country is an "it") but here it is linked with "hast", which is 2nd person.

On the contrary countries were not always "it" and designated a gender, mother Russia, La France, Britannia, Possibly USA via "lady Columbia" (or more recently Uncle Sam), mother India etc.  Germany and Wales etc. Fatherland in terms of "land of our fathers", but also motherland of native land may be used interchangeably.  Fatherland used in many European/latin origin countries, some Nordic, African and Pakistan also.  Places like Sweden, genderless.  He/she/it are all 3rd person, but if the author directly addressing the country rather than about it then having a gender, and a more intimate sense of identity and connection to the land, then referring in the 2nd person as "you" rather than "it" is not out of place and poetical.

"Italia" - female, 2nd person, motherland, intimate connection - hast."

Reworded in a clearer expanded manner:

"Italy (Italia) my motherland, thou hast fame..."

                                       Italia, la mia patria, tu hai la fama

Neither ungrammatical, 2nd person feminine - nor so out of place in a not so modern world.  In fact it just strengthens the translation as poetical and archaic.

Bunny

Thank you for the reply dear bunny. If you want to give Italy any grammatical gender (male, female, neuter) and any level of formality (formal, informal, intimate) I am fine with all that. But the grammatical person (1st 2nd 3rd) is a different matter. In this sentence, it seems clear he is talking about Italy, and its "banking line" (whatever that is). There is nothing to suggest that the speaker is talking to Italy, and if he was it would be very odd in Western European languages (cf. "England are great").