8-bit characters input

[Marco De Vitis <starless@spin.it>]

Hi, I know this is a FAQ, but I've browsed for hours through the docs 
without finding any real solution.

I can't input 8-bit chars in Emacs when I'm on the command line; 
especially, I need to type Italian accented chars (e.g. àèìòù). I simply 
want that an "è" appears when I press the "è" key; I want to avoid any 
deadkeys and such.
Currently, instead, when I type one of those chars, it seems like some 
control code is inserted (e.g. when I press "à" the cursor moves down 
some lines).

This applies to various situations:
- when logging locally on a Debian Etch machine (Emacs 21.4.1, locale 
en_US.UTF-8);
- when using locally a MacOS X Terminal (Emacs 21.2.1, locale it_IT.UTF-8);
- when logging remotely on that same Debian machine from the same OSX 
Terminal using ssh;
- when logging remotely on that same Debian machine from a Windows XP 
machine using PuTTy.

In all those situations, I can happily input and view 8-bit chars on the 
bash command line, e.g. when reading files with less. But they stop 
showing when I use Emacs.
To say the truth, they don't even work in other command line text 
editors such as vi or pico, so it might not be a strictly-emacs problem, 
but Emacs is my editor of choice in this situations so I need to fix it 
in there.
On the other hand, if I launch X on the Debian machine and start Emacs 
in the GUI environment, accented chars work fine.

By reading the docs, I tried setting some of the suggested options for 
similar problems, to no avail. I suspect that Emacs' docs regarding this 
subject are generally oriented towards more "exotic" configurations and 
needs than mine.

Does anyone here have any clues on how to fix this problem? It would be 
very useful for me. Thanks.

-- 
Ciao,
   Marco.