prices on things in italy, 1960's.

[sunfright]

Setting: Naples, 1964-ish.

When I try looking up the price of things in lira (ITL), I can't make Google help me, probably I'm not looking up the right stuff, but I thought maybe I could be so lucky that some of you guys would know or at least, have an idea...

So, do any of you know how things like a woman's haircut, getting your hair permed or various fish + shellfish (the exact thing purchased being two cuttlefish and half a kilo of prawns) would be priced in the 1960's, Italy?

Thanks so much for any help!

Comments

[jadelennox]

Not an actual answer, because I have no Italian and I don't trust Google translate for this, but have you tried historical newspaper ads? That's what I would suggest for pricing research for this kind of thing in general. I spent a minute searching for "gambretti" in some of the newspapers listed at https://eudocs.lib.byu.edu/index.php/Italy:HistoricalNewspapers_and_Journals_Online (and there's more in the Internet Archive); that's how I'd look.

(The problem with google translate is that it doesn't tell you what words are scientific vs. casual vs. pre-cooked food vs. cooked food vs. live animal, like rooster/poultry/chicken. After poking around the websites of contemporary Italian grcery stores I think I should have searched for "gamberi" and "scampi", not gambretti. YMMV depending on the quality of your Italian.)

[sunfright]

Ooooh, thank you so much! I had completely not thought of using newspapers that way and this should prove very helpful. I'll look into it!

[miscellanium]

seconding the recommendation for newspapers! one thing to keep in mind is that southern italy has historically been poorer than the rest of the country, so it might also depend on where this is set.

you may have already considered this, but inflation calculators can also be helpful for at least estimating what something might have cost. ads from the time period would def be the authority - if you can't find helpful newspaper results, you could try borrowing some of the language from this exhibition on advertisements from the 1950s-1970s and seeing if that gets you anywhere. i'm not fluent in italian so i can't be more help, sorry!

[sunfright]

This is set in Naples, so that first bid was very useful to know!

Thank you so much for taking the time to point me to these things, I really appreciate it a lot! Makes my search much easier.

[abyssray]

There is a site that does store this stuff, but I imagine you haven't found it because it is purely in Italian.

Google Translate might work in that regard, it also has a search engine on its homepage so perhaps you'll be able to find more specific things.

https://www.storiologia.it/apricrono/storia/a1960.htm

[sunfright]

Omg, this comes as a godsend, thank you so much!! I'll make it work. This is exactly what I need!!