stress / accento tonico

usually, italian words are stressed on the next–to–the–last syllable. 

when the final –e is dropped from a word, as happens with some masculine titles when they are directly followed by a proper name, the position of the stress remains unchanged.

when words are stressed on the last vowel, they always have a written accent over that vowel.

it is useful to remember that open e and o occur only in stressed syllables.

note: the written accent is used with a few monosyllables in order to distinguish them from others that have the same spelling but a different meaning.