Site management

The fourth entry is il capocantiere, and the difficulty is not the word but its plural. Italian builds a long series of job titles on capo, the head, and they do not all behave alike. Where capo names the person in charge of whatever follows, the plural mark goes on capo and the second noun never moves: i capicantiere, i capistazione, i capisquadra, i capireparto, i capifamiglia. Where capo instead means the foremost specimen of a class, the reverse holds and the ending sits at the far end: il capolavoro gives i capolavori, and il capoluogo gives i capoluoghi. So the question to put to any of these compounds is whether it names the boss of something or the best of something. One more turn: when a woman holds the post the whole thing freezes, and la capocantiere gives le capocantiere, with the article left to do all the counting. English offers no footing here, because « site managers » takes its single mark where English always takes it, at the very end.