mostaccio

Forms

mostaccio m (plural mostacci)^[1] Old forms include mostacio, mostazo, mostazzo, mustaccio and mustazzo.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Medieval Latin mustacium, recorded in the plural in a 7th-century gloss, the Erfurt glossary.^[1][3][4] The Latin word was taken from Byzantine Greek μουστάκιον (moustákion), a diminutive of Ancient Greek μύσταξ (mústax, “upper lip; moustache”).^{[1][3][5][6][7][8]} Zingarelli compares μάσταξ (mástax, “mouth”), and Nocentini traces the Greek word to an imitative root, as in muso.^[9][10] Wiktionary compares Sicilian mustazzu.^[1]

The same Greek word later gave mustacchio, through Medieval Greek, in the 16th century.^[10][4] Meyer-Lübke saw the matter differently: Old Italian mostacchio gave French moustache and Spanish mostacho, and this word, in the sense “snout”, came back from Spanish.^[11] He also thought that Romanian mustață points to *mustacium, which could also underlie this word.^[11]

Earliest recorded meaning

GRADIT dates the word to the second half of the 14th century, in the old form mostazo.^[3] An early poem, the Storia di Stefano, threatens to strike someone's mostazo with the fist; the sense is “face”.^[2] The word appears earlier as a name: Jacopo Mostacci or Mostazzi, perhaps from Pisa, was an imperial falconer and poet in 1240.^[4]

Semantic evolution

In the chivalric poems the word is the face that gets hit: Orlando's mostaccio is all bruised, and in Pulci Rinaldo strikes Salicorno in the face with his gauntlet.^[2][12] Pulci also has it for “snout, mug”, and it is used of a horse's muzzle.^[4] The plural mostacci meant “moustache” in the 16th century, when Turkish-style moustaches came into fashion;^[4][10] Garzoni mocked the barbers' new mostacchi.^[4][10]

Today the word is literary or jocular for “face”, often contemptuous, in phrases such as rompere il mostaccio a qualcuno “to smash someone's face”.^[3][5][9][8] In some regions it is still a form of mustacchio, also in its nautical senses.^[7][9] Spanish, Catalan and Galician have the word, which Wiktionary describes as borrowed from Italian.^[1]

Timeline

• 7th century – The Erfurt glossary has Latin mustacia.^[4][1]
• 1240 – Jacopo Mostacci, a falconer and poet, is named.^[4]
• Second half of the 14th century – Mostazo is recorded.^[3][5]
• 16th century – Mostacci and mustacchi are used for moustaches in the Turkish fashion.^[4][10]

Meanings

Noun

1. (jocular, often derogatory) face, mug: gli ha dato un pugno sul mostaccio.^{[3][5][6][9][7]}
2. (popular, regional) A moustache; the same as mustacchio.^[3][9][7]

Word family

• mostaccino
• mostacciata
• mostaccione
• smostacciare

Related words

• mustacchio
• muso

Usage notes

Rompere il mostaccio a qualcuno means “to beat someone up”, and dire qualcosa sul mostaccio “to say something to someone's face”.^[8][5] Zingarelli lists mostacciuolo as a diminutive of mostaccio; the sweet mostacciolo has another origin.^[9][10]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca
3. ^ a b c d e f g De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 682
5. ^ a b c d e Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
7. ^ a b c d Duro, Aldo (ed.) (1986–1994), Vocabolario della lingua italiana, Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana; online ed. treccani.it/vocabolario (2008 copy)
8. ^ a b c Gabrielli, Aldo (2020), Grande dizionario italiano, digital ed., Milano: Hoepli
9. ^ a b c d e f Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
10. ^ a b c d e f Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
11. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
12. ^ Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET