Sixty-six is 'e ddoje zetelle, the two spinsters. The doubled dd is the usual Neapolitan lengthening after the article; zetella is zitella, an unmarried woman past the age at which the neighbourhood expected her to marry.
The figure survives the crossing to Sicily unchanged. The Trapani board has le du schiette on the same number, which makes 66 one of the strongest agreements on the whole grid.
- 66
- 'E ddoje zetelle
- the two spinsters
- Row 61–70 of the tabellone
Where the figure comes from
This is one of the few squares where a documented shape explanation exists, and it comes from Sicily rather than Naples. The Trapani folk-traditions association glosses its 66 as two female figures, one per digit, watching the world go by. The Neapolitan lists say nothing, but the two 6s are hard to unsee once the Sicilians have pointed at them.
Other things filed on 66
In Neapolitan life
The spinsters belong to a small set of squares carrying social judgement rather than an object: the fool at 23, the grumbler at 60, the worthless man at 71. The board is a record of what a nineteenth-century Neapolitan street thought was worth remarking on.
66 in the smorfia — frequently asked
Because there are two digits. The Sicilian board's compilers say so explicitly for their own 66; the Neapolitan lists leave it unstated.
Yes, unusually. Naples has 'e ddoje zetelle and Trapani le du schiette on the same number.