selva

forest

noun SEL-vah Rare

Origin: From Latin silva (forest, woodland).

Also means

dense wood

Usage Note

Selva evokes a wilder, denser, and more literary forest than bosco (a common wood) or foresta (large forest). It appears famously in the opening line of Dante's Inferno: Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita mi ritrovai per una selva oscura. In modern Italian it carries a poetic or archaic register.

Examples

"Il cacciatore si perse nella selva oscura."

Natural Translation

The hunter got lost in the dark forest.

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