#6 Lezioni d’italiano – Cani, maiali, uccelli

How do animals are bad words in Italian? I lead you into the mysteries of zoology in the Italian language.

The dog, il cane, in its animal form is a loyal pet, but as a person, it is a disaster. If a person, especially a supposed expert, is un cane, it means that this person is very bad at doing something. It could be a doctor, dentist, engineer, or mechanic, have many academic degrees but still being un cane: just avoid it.

Pigs are a beloved delicacy to eat, but when it comes to language they are so bad as you can think: and still, anytime you can catch maiale or porco spoken in everyday casual conversation.
Un maiale or un porco is a morally dirty person, in a sexual way: it’s a noun that occurs sometimes in a standard conversation.

But it’s porco as an adjective that leads the list of most common bad words: just add porco to a substantiv and you’re swearing at different levels of vulgarity, starting by mentioning an stupid duck up to the most common blasphemy.
Porco cane!, porca l’oca!, porca vacca!, mean something like bloody dog, bloody duck and bloody cow.  We already talked about cane, the disaster; oca, the duck, is considered stupid; vacca, a cow is a reference to a vulgar woman. They can be perceived as childish but many adults use those. Porco mondo is the neutral bloody world. With porca puttana, the vulgarity is already high, because the noun puttana (only feminine) means slut. Surprisingly, in the mostly catholic Italy it is very common the blasphemy against God, Dio, built up with porco as an adjective. Especially in some regions, it belongs to everyday language. Some people change the blasphemy into porco zio: nobody ever understood what the poor uncle (zio) did to become the politically correct replacement for the divine name, except the phonetic resemblance, of course.

Birds are interesting: the simple word uccello (bird), refers to the dick, the vagina is the sparrow, passera (female, with -a suffix). Un pollo, a chicken, as you can guess, is someone very fearful, stupid and who can be easily tricked. Un pappagallo is a talkative and not interesting person who repeats what someone else said (often, the tv).

Come and learn the Italian zoo of bad words, only with Lezioni d’italiano.

#5Lezioni d’Italiano – from figa to sfiga

We had a good time with the back and the front of the male body, now let’s move to us girls.
Figa / Fica (/k/ and /g/ depends on regional pronounciation of the velar consonants) is the female reproductive organ. It’s very flattering, almost every Italian word that shares the root figa has a positive meaning.
First of all, one figa is not only the vagina: with an extention of meaning, the substantive covers the complete good looking female person. It could be surprising for not-Italian speakers, it is also used the masculin, fig-o (typical suffix -o) to describe a good looking man. As an adjective, associated to any word, from a movie to a car, figo / figa is a synonim of cool: there’s a scent of beauty and a suggestion of good performance, just in one word.

The prefix S- comes from the Latin heritage of the prefix ex-, that (among others) suggest the idea of privation, of movement from a situation, in a few words a change in the opposite direction. It happens, for example, with the adjective contento / scontento (happy/unhappy) or with verbs like fiorire/sfiorire (to bloom, to fade). By putting a S- before figa, you build up the dangerous substantive sfiga. It means bad luck. I think a man invented that word, someone who had to move away from a previous situation “with figa” to a condition “without figa“, leading us directly again to the Latin prefix ex-.
I would like to underline again that the Italian language often takes a word and builds up a family of related concepts with it: it happened with our bad words, it just work in the same way here with sfiga. A sfigato is someone with bad luck, che sfiga! is a very common exclamation and it means “what a bad luck!, also with a hint of (feminine?) empathy.

Follow Lezioni d’Italiano and remember the most important thing: from figa to sfiga, it’s only a matter of a S.

#4 Lezioni d’italiano – Coglioni e palle

In the last few months, during those long weeks of lockdown, we have been scared, distressed, we had also our coglioni full and we had often felt treated like a group of coglioni.
Coglioni means testicles: it’s often used in plural form as it’s a two-piece article. Its singluar form, one coglione, is just another of the many synonyms for idiot.
I coglioni or le palle/balle (balls), both are words of common use. Palle/balle is less vulgar, but still not to be spoken around children.

The concept of virility is of course linked to coglioni / balle: having i coglioni / le palle, especially if they present a barely believable squared form (quadrate), it means that one is extremely brave. It could be also a woman with i coglioni: instead of a circus rarity, she is considered a brave woman.

The semantic paradigma of coglioni and balle is interesting: it starts with virility and develops into a big range of expressions involving a disturbance. I believe it’s due to the physical form of the object, hanging there between the legs and seen as a moving, expanding or twisting entity.
Starting simple, che coglioni / che balle means what a bore; when girano le balle, your balls twist, you let people understand that you are getting angry, and when hai i coglioni pieni (you have the testicles full) you can’t stand the situation anymore, because it’s a bore or it’s difficult. My German friends have their snout full (die Schnauze voll), Italians have those other parts down there. Some people stay on the coglioni – stare sui coglioni, or even break the coglioni – rompono i coglioni, thus provoking a big nuisance. You should ask them to move away from the balle, andare fuori dalle balle.

Balle or palle (the bilabial plosives are both correct) does not only translate testicles, but also, with a big jump, lies. A contaballe, (local: cacciaballe) is a liar, you should be careful.

Take care of your pronounciation, because gl does not exist in English: /ko’ʎoni/ “gl” is similar (vaguely) to the double L in million.

Very important: men, for mere physical reasons, must know that the very Italian superstitious gesture of toccarsi i coglioni / le balle (touching one’s own coglioni) avoids bad luck but is considered a crime against decency in Italy.
I don’t believe that any amount of luck is worth a try. Keep your hands away from there, and follow Lezioni d’italiano, instead.

#3 Lezioni d’italiano – Cazzo

Oh cazzo, we are already dealing with lesson 3 of our Lezioni d’italiano. This one is going to be long and I don’t use this word by mistake: cazzo means dick, penis, the “male part” (Schwanz). Why the cazzo became so popular and multi-meaning in everyday Italian language, while my German friends seem to prefer merda (Scheiße) and my English speaking friends like fottere (fuck) as their favourite bad word, I don’t know.

Starting with its basic meaning of the sexual male part, the Italian language paints some interesting images: to stay on the cazzo (stare sul cazzo) looses any reference to sexual pleasure but suggests on the contrary a strong dislike.
It is also very annoying to meet a testa di cazzo: pay attention here, the correct translation in English and German leaves the male body parts and involves a movement to the back of the body: it means asshole (Arschloch). A testa di cazzo often tells cazzate (bullshit) and will lead you to be incazzato (angry) for many hours.
Grammar note: incazzar-si is a reflexive verb. It requires a subject who is getting angry, a reflexive pronoun referring to the subject who is getting angry and then verbal form. Ex. Io mi incazzo. Who is angry is twice specified, there is no chance to be mistaken.

Forget the literal meaning now, because it will lead you to a big surprise when people will ask which cazzo you want, make or tell. Cazzo substitutes the more devilish but less vulgar what the hell.
Che cazzo fai? What the hell are you doing? Che cazzo vuoi? What the hell do you want? Che cazzo dici? What the hell are you saying? Dove cazzo vai? Where the hell are you going?

Male readers will not be very proud now: cazzo is also a synonim of “nothing at all”.
Per un cazzo does not care if the preposition per (for / through) suggests a possible use of the penis as a tool, it means “not at all”.
Non fregarsene un cazzo is a difficult verb, reflexive as explained before + the little partitive ne. It implies that you won’t rub a dick about that, better said, you don’t care at all about that.
Anything described as del cazzo has very little value especially conversations but also food, situations etc.
Women, even if they do not have the mentioned body part have nevertheless the right to say col cazzo that we do something, because they mean that they are not doing it at all.

Last but not least: to do our own cazzi (it’s a standard change from suffix -o of the masculine singular noun to the -i of the plural) is literally a grotesque image now I think of it… it means that we are doing our own fucking business.

If the situation turns out bad, they will be cazzi amari (lit. bitter dicks) for us, my friends. Stay healthy, laugh, learn and follow Lezioni d’italiano.

#2 Lezioni d’italiano – Merda

There are 2 reasons for choosing merda as our second word: first, the deep “relationship” between culo and merda; second, the German word Scheiße is one of the most known bad words.

Merda means literally shit (Scheiße). Its -a ending indicates that it is a feminine singular noun. The grammatical plural will be merde. As discussed in the previous lesson, in Italian you can add a suffix to the root of the word (here merd-) to increase / decrease the dimension of the word (but also, as I believe you already noticed, to change gender and category of number of word).
Merd-ina is just a smaller merda. (kleine Scheiße)
Merd-ona (big shit, grosse Scheiße) is a label on its own indicating a person with few moral values and a lack of intelligence. Merdona is for a woman (feminine singular), but in your life you can meet any kind of merdone (feminine plural and also masculin singular) and of merdoni (masculin, plural). A second definition of a bad person, also in the semantic world of shit, is stronzo, literally a huge shit with a specific form. The stronzo or the stronza, man or woman, is a person with little morality but also with some malice. I am sure you know some stronzi, as well as I do. The English translation is asshole, in German Arschloch: shit is not mentioned, but we’re very near.

Merda! is a very common exclamation when something isn’t working as it should or happening as desired. Shit!, Scheiße! are used exactly in the same way.

When something turns out bad, you can say it is “di merda”. The weather tempo di merda, a person persona di merda, a man or a woman uomo/donna di merda, a situation situazione di merda, the food cibo di merda and many others. (Scheiß+word works in the same way).

Being nella merda describes the image of a person struggling to keep the head up at the surface and survive in a big pool full of shit. Clearly, it means that a situation you’re living is very complicated. If you want to add more force to this concept, you can say that you are being nella merda fino al collo: immerged in this pool full of shit up to the neck.

Cacca is another word for merda, and I mention it here because the German cacke is perceived as moderately vulgar, but cacca isn’t. It is childish, not vulgar: it is one of the first 4 words an Italian speaking child learns, next to mamma, papà, pappa (food). Words related to cacca, change the second voiceless velar plosive /k/ (c) with a voiced velar plosive /g/ and in doing this, they also gain their vulgar taste. Without further talking about phonemes: cacc- becomes cag-. The verb defecate is, as a matter of facts, not caccare but cagare. Mi fai cagare means that you disgust me. Cagarsi sotto is a way of expressing fear (to have the shit scared out of you / Scheiß-Angst.).

Very important: if you step in shit when strolling through the neighbourhood don’t get mad, it’s good luck.

Instead of cagarsi sotto for this situazione di merda of Coronavirus, even if siamo nella merda fino al collo, challenge yourself again and follow Lezioni d’italiano.

#1 Lezioni d’italiano – Culo

I don’t know any other language so colorful with bad words and we are living in constant stress… let’s say, it’s the perfect moment to learn Italian. I will try to explain how bad words are used, what they mean in most common situations, with a hint to a German perspective.

Our first word is culo.
Its standard meaning is ass (Arsch). I choose it because German has many “Arsch-themed” bad words while in Italian we have a more limited range.

In Italian it is common to add a suffix to a noun/adjective/adverb to decrease or to increase the “size” of the word and quite often the meaning will also change.
We will take the root of the word culo, which is cul– and add a suffix.
Cul-one, is a just a bigger culo, (Großer Arsch) no matter what.
Cul-etto is a smaller culo (Kleiner Arsch). Curiously, by diminishing the size you will also decrease the vulgar connotation of the word. Culetto is commonly accepted, especially in reference to a child (which in German will be Popo).
A few common expressions are: to have il pepe nel culo (Pfeffer in dem Arsch haben) it’s a very good image for someone who is in a chaotic hurry. To have il culo parato / pararsi il culo (der gepanzerte Arsch) means that you could do badly in a situation because someone / something is protecting you.

The second meaning of the word culo, is luck (Gluck).
Che culo! means that you are impressed by the luck someone had in a particular situation. My German friends will have to translate with Was fur ein Glück! and surely NOT with Was fur ein Arsch! (This one has too many translations in Italian, we will deal with it by and by.)
Sometimes you can have una botta di culo, but mostly you are hoping for one. Una botta di culo (ein Arsch-schlag), means a moment of pure luck especially in something difficult to achieve or with big risks involved.
With this concept in mind, il culo del principiante explains itself easily as the Beginner’s luck (Anfangersglück).

Let’s end this very short compendium with the most popular Italian word in the whole world: vaffanculo. (verpisst dich)
As you can see, it has clearly something to do with culo, in its basic meaning, ass (Arsch).
Vaffanculo is the reduction of the complete sentence vai a fare in culo. Literally, you are inviting someone to go away and have passive anal sex, but its common meaning has changed into to stop it / go away because you’re disturbing with your presence and as you’re going, please do something else (a suggestion of what to to with your time instead of disturbing is explicit). Vai a dare via il culo, is also a common equivalent expression.

See you next time with another bad word, keep calm and follow Lezioni d’italiano.