What was the Italianish insult my grandma used to use?

December 11, 2018 6:03 AM

When she got riled up, my grandma would call my pop something that sounded like - I think - "scusdamadh." Maybe that last consonant was a rolled r with a dropped vowel after it - it's hard to know. Gram and Pop were both the children of early 20th century immigrants from southern Italy so spoke a little bit of that older Italian.

My sister recalls that Grandma said that it translated to "dirty pig" but that was almost certainly a euphemism for something more crass that Gram wasn't willing to tell us about.

I'd love to know what the Italian she was using actually was, and what its translation is.

posted by entropone to Writing & Language (6 answers total)

Best answer: According to this dictionary of italian-american slang, it means "stupid person."
posted by gauche at 6:23 AM on December 11, 2018 [3 favorites]

Response by poster: huh, that was quick and easily. i'm not sure why googling has failed me on this before. thanks gauche.
posted by entropone at 6:27 AM on December 11, 2018

Best answer: Just to add on - the entry in gauche's link gives the original word as "scostumato". Searching for that brings up definitions like

adjective
A. (immorale) "immoral", "dissolute"
B. (maleducato) "bad-mannered", "boorish"

masculine noun
(vedi agg)
A. "dissolute person"
B. "boor"

Wiktionary gives the etymology as:
s- (“not”) +‎ costumato (“decent”)

And this Italian dictionary entry is fun to look through even without knowing Italian, since certain words stand out (Dissoluto, licenzioso, immorale, ...)
posted by trig at 8:01 AM on December 11, 2018 [1 favorite]

I think scostumato is also along the lines of "uncouth" or "boorish."
posted by lazuli at 8:02 AM on December 11, 2018 [1 favorite]

Or what trig said.
posted by lazuli at 8:03 AM on December 11, 2018

Correct, it is like boorish. It's not a curse word, but definitely something you say to someone you are very angry with (but never your boss/someone you don't know well, unless you don't care about the poaaible repercussions).
posted by dubhemerak3000 at 12:25 PM on December 19, 2018