A tempo marking indicating a moderately slow pace, at a walking speed; a movement or passage played at such a tempo.
The Full Story
Italian18th century (English adoption)well-attested
From Italian 'andante' (going, walking), the present participle of 'andare' (to go, to walk). The etymology of Italian 'andare' is one of the great puzzles of Romance linguistics — it appears to have no single Latin ancestor. Proposed sources include Latin 'ambulāre' (to walk), Latin 'adnāre' (to swim to, to go toward), and various Vulgar Latin or pre-Roman forms. Whatever its origin, 'andante' in music captures
Did you know?
Theetymology of Italian 'andare' (to go) — the root of 'andante' — is one of the unsolved mysteries of Romance linguistics. Latin had 'īre' (to go) and 'ambulāre' (to walk), but Italian replaced both with 'andare,' a word that doesn't clearly descend from either. Scholars have proposed over a dozen origins, including