mafioso · noun — A member of the Mafia. It carries an Arena rating of 1318, earned across 76 head-to-head judged battles.
Definition from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, mafioso ranks #1,525 of 17,146 for Words That Escaped Their Books, #2,697 of 17,166 for Most Vivid Words, #2,920 of 17,169 for Scariest Words, #3,428 of 17,125 for Most Storied Words.
mafioso is pronounced /ˌmɑfiˈoʊˌsoʊ/.
Why “mafioso” is a great word
MAFIOSO — [Noun] A sworn member of the Mafia, a secret, oath-bound criminal society of Sicilian origin. From Italian *mafioso*, from Sicilian *mafiusu* (“swaggerer, bold, enterprising”). Unlike “gangster,” a generic term for a criminal thug, or “racketeer,” which specifies one who runs illicit schemes, a *mafioso* is defined by his allegiance to a specific, codified underworld culture. He is the quiet man at the café whose knuckles are scarred from a ritual knife-cut; the deceptive warmth of a kiss on the cheek that seals a contract of blood; the immaculate suit worn to a murder—a life defined entirely by the bonds that imprison it.
❧ Essay by Lexicurio’s AI · definition, etymology & citations from published sources
Etymology
Borrowed from Italian mafioso, from Sicilian mafiusu.
noun
- A member of the Mafia.e.g.“Phil put his arms around him. Drew him in close, pressed his cheek to Dane's the way the Mafiosi in the fifties would kiss somebody right before they punched his ticket.” — 2006, Tom Piccirilli, Headstone City, Random House, →ISBN, retrieved 08 Dec 2021, page 189:
- A member of the Mafia.; A male member of the Mafia.e.g.“The widow of one murdered Mafioso gave her son the bloody jacket that her husband had been killed in. […] So far there has not been a Mafiosa who has made it to the top on her own.” — 1998, World Press Review, volume 45, page 43, columns 1–2:
Definitions & examples from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).
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