furbo

furbo
cunning or crafty person

Only after years of visiting Italy did I realize that Italians admire rather than disdain a furbo, someone who can pull off a clever deception. “Che furbetto!” a young mother exclaimed rather proudly when her son shifted the blame for a childish prank to his little brother.

An impressed friend recounted how a shrewd furbacchione had obtained a coveted building permit for a rectangular, cement-lined hole in his backyard by describing it, not as a swimming pool (prohibited by law), but as a storage vat for water that local firefighters might need to douse a blaze. A more deceitful furbastro would somehow manage to make money in the process, while a wheeler-dealer furbone would go after big profits by negotiating permits for an entire village.

The furbo holds a prominent place in Italian history. Although best known as a seducer, Giovani Giacomo Casanova (1725-1798) swindled his way to (and through) several fortunes. The self-declared Count of Cagliostro (1743-1795), a Sicilian street urchin, conned gullible souls across Europe with magical elixirs for youth and potency, mystical spells and skillful forgeries.

The Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini (1883-1945) hoodwinked Hitler himself. When the Fuhrer visited Rome in May, 1938, Il Duce proudly displayed a prosperous imperial city. But its walls of gleaming travertine marble were nothing more than painted stage sets. The poet Trilussa wrote a famous epigram in Roman dialect on the occasion:

“Roma de travertino, / rifatta de cartone, / saluta l’imbianchino, / suo prossimo padrone.”
(“Rome of travertine, re-made with cardboard, greets the house pointer who will be her next master”)

My husband, transformed from Bob to Roberto in Italy, cannot resist a linguistic version of furbizia by casually dropping well-rehearsed Italian witticisms into conversations as if he were fluent. Italian acquaintances invariably applaud Professor Roberto for his cleverness.

However, some furbizia also lurks in my soul. The very first aphorism I taught Bob—and encouraged him to say on every occasion—was, Mia moglie ha sempre ragione. My wife is always right.

Sayings and Expressions:

Non fare il furbo—don’t try to be clever.

Per conoscere un furbo, ci vuole un furbo e mezzo – to know a trickster, it takes a trickster and a half (roughly, it takes one to know one)

An Italian friend recalls a childhood rhyme her friends would recite while rhythmically bouncing a ball against a wall:

Calzolaio Furbacchione (The shrewed shoemaker)
Fa le scarpe di cartone (makes shoes out of cardboard)
La signora non ci bada (the lady doesn’t notice)
Perde il tacco a meta’ strada (she loses the heel along the way).

cafone

cafone
peasant, bumpkin, hick

Every country has its share of jerks, clods and ignorant slobs, but Italian reserves the word “cafone” (pronounced cah-fon-ay) for its home-grown variety. This utterly Italian insult traces its history back to Cafo or Cafonis, a centurion of Mark Anthony, mentioned several times by Cicero. Its linguistic pedigree includes a debut in Italian literature in 1861, the year of the nation’s unification, in a publication called La perseveranza (Perseverance).

Cafone can apply to any generic dork, but Italian offers distinctions for the son of an ignorant bumpkin (figlio d’un cafone), a crude slob (cafone rozzo), a tasteless boob (cafone sciocco), an ill-mannered fool (cafone maleducato), an officious ass (cafone impertinente), a tasteless jerk (cafone senza gusto), and a disgusting boor (cafone ripugnante).

The most recent Galateo (Italian etiquette book) includes a “dizionario delle cafonate,” an alphabetical listing of boorish behaviors that include throwing chewing gum on the ground per la gioia delle suole altrui (for the joy of others’ soles); sticking a finger into un pertugio del corpo (a body opening), grattarsi ostentatamente (scratching oneself ostentatiously) and using fingernails as stuzzicadenti (toothpicks).

I have used cafone exactly once—at a free concert celebrating April 21, Rome’s official birthday, at the city’s opera house. The mainly elderly Romans, dressed smartly (as their generation always does), were already seated when a pudgy foreigner in shorts and a tee shirt squeezed into our row to take the empty seat next to mine.

“Please don’t let him be American,” I prayed, but as soon as I heard his string of “Excuse me’s,” I knew he was. Just as he sat down, he erupted into a volcanic sneeze. Obviously lacking a handkerchief, he blotted his nose with the back of one hand and then wiped it dry on his hairy thigh. The appalled woman on my other side and I locked eyes and almost simultaneously mouthed the same words, “Che cafone!”

Cafone also can refer to something molto buono (very good): pane cafone, the simple daily bread of Naples and the surrounding region. You don’t need Italian to follow this basic recipe. Just watch Mr. Bread at work:



Sayings and Expressions:

If you encounter a cafone:
Ma Lei, cafone ci è nato o ci è diventato? -- Were you born rude or did you become rude?

Synonyms (useful if you ever find yourself trading insults with a cafone): rozzo, villano, zotico, buzzurro, maleducato