Conversazione

[H]e was frequently present at the breakfast-table and conversazioni of Sir Joseph Banks, and instructed several persons of eminence in the classics.

"I'm too detached to talk scandal, and yet at scientific conversaziones I have heard something of Challenger, for he is one of those men whom nobody can ignore."

Willie Redmond told of finding him [Oscar Wilde], to his astonishment, at the conversazione of some theatrical society, standing amid an infuriated crowd, mocking with more than all his old satirical wit the actors and their country.

The one significant exception that was allowed was if an Indian habitually wore European clothes in public, then he would be allowed to wear shoes in the presence of his English masters on such occasions of western-style rituals such as the governor general's levee, a drawing room, conversazione or a ball.

He was a guest particularly sought after for conversation-assemblies, evening conversation parties, or conversaziones, which flourished in London from the 1750s into the 1780s, and which Johnson attended during the last fifteen years of his life.

Another form of young Victoria entertainment was the church conversazione. The Bishop opened, shut and blessed the affair but the congregation did the talking. Conversaziones were held in the church schoolroom which the ladies cut into little cubicles with benches—three sitting sides and one open. The benches were just close enough for one lady's lips to reach across confidentially to the opposite lady's ear. There was music for people who were not chatty and when everything had been done and encored tea was served.