Seventy-eight is 'a bella figliola, the beautiful girl — and the reference lists gloss her without hesitation as a prostitute. The pretty name is the euphemism; the metaphor column is where the board says what it means.
This is one of the squares that proves the smorfia was not a book people consulted so much as a code people spoke.
- 78
- 'A bella figliola
- the beautiful girl
- Row 71–80 of the tabellone
Where the figure comes from
No recorded reason for the number. The gloss is on every published list, Italian and Neapolitan alike.
Other things filed on 78
In Neapolitan life
Matilde Serao recorded the number in use in a Naples courtroom in 1884. A woman had punched another and broken her face; asked to explain herself before the magistrate she said «m'ha chiammata sittantotto» — she called me a seventy-eight. Serao's dry addition is the best line in the chapter: the judge had to send for a smorfia to find out what was so insulting about the number.
78 in the smorfia — frequently asked
The published lists gloss 'a bella figliola as a prostitute. The name on the square is the polite version.
Yes, and it reached a courtroom. Serao reports a 1884 assault case in which the provocation was being called a seventy-eight, and the judge had to look the number up.