I have been throwing around a lot of model names as I write and a quick history and breakdown of the different Giulietta and Giulia variations seems like it would be helpful. This off the top of my head with ideas and historical details gleaned from various sources. Pictures are mostly period advertising photos or those taken from classifieds.

Before a description of the models is attempted it’s important to understand that Alfa Romeo didn’t build whole cars in the way we think of the process today. Alfa Romeo built some cars entirely in-house but mostly they sent a chassis with running gear to one of many Carrozzeria who were contracted to build cars around the chassis, which were then sold as Alfa Romeo’s. These Carrozzeria included Touring, Pininfarina, Zagato, Ghia, Colli and many other names familiar to lovers of the Italian cars of this era. In about 1952 Alfa decided to undertake the design and production of a small affordable car, the 750, so they approached various Carrozzeria to produce prototypes. It is said that Alfa intended to launch the line with a sedan or ‘Berlina’ but somehow in the messy process that is bringing a product to market the Sprint ended up being ready first.

The 750 eventually came to be called the Giulietta. There are a few different accounts of the origin of this name for the cars, but all accounts seem to point to it being a play on ‘Romeo and Jiuliet’. Giulietta is the diminuative of Jiuliet and the Giulietta is a small car compared to previous Alfa models, so it makes some sense that it would be called this. Of course Giulietta grew up and they called her Giulia.

The models:

Nose of an early Sprint 750.

Follow the links below to the Sprints model information and register* pages.

Sprint 750B Normale First series

750B 1493*00001 – 06611 ~6000 units built.

Sprint Veloce 750E Alleggerita

750E 1493*01380 – 04718 ~610 units built

Sprint Veloce 750E Confortevole

750E 1493*04719 – 06611 ~200 units built

Sprint 750B Normale Second Series

Sprint Veloce 750E Second Series

Sprint 10102/10105 Normale

Sprint Veloce 10106/10124

Sprint 1600 10112

Follow this link to the Berlina and TI Sedans model information and register* page.

Follow the links below to the Spiders model information and register* pages.

Spider 750D Normale

Spider Veloce 750F

Spider 10103/10104 Normale

Spider Veloce 10107/10125

Spider 1600 Normale

Spider Veloce 1600

Follow the links below to the Sprint Speciale model information and register* pages.

Sprint Speciale 10120

Sprint Speciale 10121

Follow this link to the Sprint Zagato model information and register* pages.

*A note about the registers found in the linked pages: I have had a lot of positive feedback from the SS register and thought that a register for the rest of the family might be a nice addition. There are other registers out there but I’ve noticed over the years that pages come and go and sometimes when they go the information never becomes public again. This will be a work in progress with the layout likely changing several times before I come to a format that makes the most sense. If you have a car, or know of a car that is not listed here let me know.

The first line is the Fusi stated range for the year and the following are numbers on cars that have been reported. d’Amico and Tabucchi have some differences listed and I’ll try and work them in later. Eventually as enough data points become available I’ll modify or remove the year/range headings and provide a better view of the flow of things at Alfa and particularly Bertone in through these production runs. An entry ending in Ref. is for an important car which may or may not exist.

Thanks to John de Boer whose Italian Car Registry was the seed I built on, Greig Smith who provided a lot of insight, stories and SVC numbers, Laurence Anderson who kept track of the cars he came in to contact with over the years, Patrick Hung for getting the BB based Giuliettas all in one place and Andrew Watry for Giulietta Sedan numbers who along with Christopher Boles for showed what a long term, well managed register can look like. Of course the biggest thanks to all of you who own these cars for sharing.