Nave is a town and comune

Comune

In Italy, the comune is the basic administrative division, and may be properly approximated in casual speech by the English word township or municipality.-Importance and function:...

in the province of Brescia

Province of Brescia

The Province of Brescia is a Province in Lombardy, Italy. It borders with the province of Sondrio in the N and NW, the province of Bergamo in the W, province of Cremona in the SW and S, the province of Mantova to the S, and to the east, the province of Verona and Trentino .Source for statistical...

, in Lombardy

Lombardy

Lombardy is one of the 20 regions of Italy. The capital is Milan. One-sixth of Italy's population lives in Lombardy and about one fifth of Italy's GDP is produced in this region, making it the most populous and richest region in the country and one of the richest in the whole of Europe...

, Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

. The commune is bounded by the communes of Brescia

Brescia

Brescia is a city and comune in the region of Lombardy in northern Italy. It is situated at the foot of the Alps, between the Mella and the Naviglio, with a population of around 197,000. It is the second largest city in Lombardy, after the capital, Milan...

, Caino

Caino

Caino is a comune in the province of Brescia, in Lombardy located near Valle del Garza. It is bounded by other communes of Nave and Lumezzane....

, Lumezzane

Lumezzane

Lumezzane is a town and comune in the province of Brescia, in Lombardy. It has a population of 24,304 inhabitants and is the second-largest town in the province of Brescia. It is situated in the Gobbia Valley, which is a small Valley next to the Trompia Valley.It is important because of its...

 and Bovezzo

Bovezzo

Bovezzo is a comune in the province of Brescia, in Lombardy, Italy....

. It is located in the Garza

Garza

Garza may refer to:* Garza -Mexico:* San Nicolás de los Garza, a town in the Monterrey Metropolitan area* San Pedro Garza García, a town in the Monterrey Metropolitan area* Garza Galán, a town in Coahuila-Texas:...

 valley.

The origin of the name Nave (Nae in the local Lumbard slang) is not certain. Some maintain it comes from nava (cfr. English navel) meaning the valley basin in which Nave sits, others think it is a contraction from Latin nam vallis, wide valley http://www.comune.nave.bs.it. Another possibility is it comes from Latin navis meaning ship (cfr. Italian nave

Nave

In Romanesque and Gothic Christian abbey, cathedral basilica and church architecture, the nave is the central approach to the high altar, the main body of the church. "Nave" was probably suggested by the keel shape of its vaulting...

with the same meaning) due to the overall shape of the town when seen from the Maddalena mountain. Notwithstanding this hypothesis being held as improbable, the coat of arms of the town sports a ship on it.

Originally Nave consisted in a series of loosely connected urban sections: Nave proper (Nave centro, Nae), Campanile (Campanil), Cortine (Cǜrtine), Dernago (Dernac), Mitria (Mitria), Monteclana (Monteclana), Muratello (Möradel) which eventually connected together following urbanization. This is reflected by the fact that Nave does not have a main square, which is very uncommon for an Italian town.

A Lombard language tongue twister plays on Nae being both the name of the town and a past tense of the verb nà (English to go, Italian andare): en dè che nae a Nae go 'ncontrat el pret de Nae, 'l ma dìt en do che nae me go dìt che nae a Nae, which can be translated as: I was going to Nave when I met the priest of Nave, he asked me where I was going and I told him I was going to Nave.