During a recent vacation I visited Tuscan wineries in a Fiat 500 car— known in Italy as a cinquecento (pronounced CHINK-way CHEN-tow). The word—rolling with alliteration—can apparently also add emphasis. The car is a mobile chunk of culture—compact and crammed with history, like the Italian Republic.

A Florentine winemaker named Paola, or Paolina (a diminutive or affectionate word form) drove us in her milk-white cinquecento (itself a diminutive and affectionate form of locomotion).