Italian · Hand Gestures · hand gesture
Le corna
Your partner's cheating on you / cuckold (as an insult)
genuinely rude; friends only, never at work
The gesture
"Index and pinky extended, other fingers folded, horns pointed at a person"
What your hand is actually doing.
How to use it
The horns. Jabbed toward someone — especially point-up and waggled — it's the visual of "cornuto," accusing them of being a cheated-on fool. It's an insult, and in the south a provocative one. Crucial: the SAME hand shape held point-DOWN (or touching wood/iron) is the opposite — warding off bad luck (see next entry). Direction and context are everything.
Heard in the wild
[horns jabbed at the ref] Cornutooo!
[horns at the ref] You cuckold!
Where it lands
Universal; sharper in the south
Quick answers
- What does "Le corna" mean?
- In Italian, "Le corna" means "Your partner's cheating on you / cuckold (as an insult)". Literally it's "Index and pinky extended, other fingers folded, horns pointed at a person". The horns. Jabbed toward someone — especially point-up and waggled — it's the visual of "cornuto," accusing them of being a cheated-on fool. It's an insult, and in the south a provocative one. Crucial: the SAME hand shape held point-DOWN (or touching wood/iron) is the opposite — warding off bad luck (see next entry). Direction and context are everything.
- Is "Le corna" offensive?
- It's genuinely rude — a 3/5 (Watch your audience) on the Punch-o-Meter. Fine among friends, never at work or with people you've just met.
- How do you pronounce "Le corna"?
- This one's a hand gesture — there's nothing to pronounce. Index and pinky extended, other fingers folded, horns pointed at a person.
Related in Italian
The same idea, elsewhere
Via concepts like "Screw you".
- French Enculé ! Motherf***er / bastard (one of the hardest personal insults)
- German Verpiss dich! Piss off! / Clear off (with force)!
- Greek άντε γαμήσου Go fuck yourself / get lost / piss off.
- Japanese クソ野郎 Piece of shit / shitty bastard
- Korean 개새끼 Son of a bitch / bastard — a real insult with no soft reading.
- Polish ty kurwo You whore / you bitch — the aimed kurwa, a different animal entirely.
- Portuguese Filho da puta Son of a bitch / bastard
- Russian Средний палец Screw you / the finger
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