http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinocchio
Excerpt:
Pinocchio (pronounced [piˈnɔkːjo] in Italian) is a fictional character that first appeared in 1883, in The Adventures of Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi, and has since appeared in many adaptations of that story and others. Carved by a woodcarver named Geppetto in a small Italian village,
he was created as a wooden puppet, but dreamt of becoming a real boy. Pinocchio is often a term used to describe an individual who is prone to telling lies, fabricating stories and exaggerating or creating tall tales for various reasons.
[edit] Fictional character biography
Main article: The Adventures of Pinocchio
Pinocchio is known for having a short nose that becomes longer when he is under stress (chapter 3), especially while telling a lie. His clothes are made of flowered paper, his shoes are made of wood and his hat is made of bread (page 16 of Collodi's Le Avventure di Pinocchio). Despite the fact that in Italian the name Pinocchio might be a version of 'baby pine' (a portmanteau of pino, pine, and marmocchio, brat), in fact it means pinecone which is distinctly, probably willfully illogical as the book clearly states that the puppet was made out of cherry wood. The name actually comes from a nickname: Geppetto wryly gave the puppet the name Pinocchio as an omen of good fortune: Ho conosciuto una famiglia intera di Pinocchi [...] e tutti se la passavano bene. Il più ricco di loro chiedeva l’elemosina (chapter 1) (I have known the entire Pinocchio family [...] and all of them managed well. The richest begged). However the surname itself may be derived from the Italian word nocchio, meaning a gnarl or knot in
