A TOOTHY DISTRICT?

With the world's attention having been on babies, and one baby in particular, for the past few days, I did not post yesterday or on Monday. What do you think about when you think of babies? Cribs, cradles, rattles and baby buggies? The babies themselves and how irresistibly cute they are with all the smiles, gurgles and cuddles? Or perhaps you remember the more stressful moments, like those of teething.

You could be forgiven for imagining that there are rather a lot of teething babies in a district of Modica called "Dente". Or could it be that the area has more than its fair share of dentists? Perhaps the area is shaped like a tooth? The area where I live is called the "Sorda", after a deaf woman who had a café here, so maybe a somewhat toothy lady owned a similar establishment in Dente?  No, none of these provide the reason for the district's name and I've always wondered about it.  Now, thanks to a student of mine, I can tell you the etymology of "Dente":

It seems that, at the beginning of the last century, a wooden sculpture of a Byzantine Madonna was found in the area and afterwards that part of Modica was always called "Urenti", the Sicilian dialect pronunciation of "Oriente". But this is also the way in which "dente" ["tooth"] is pronounced in Sicilian dialect. Later, when the term was translated into standard Italian, a mistake was made and the district acquired the name "Dente" instead of "Oriente."