Definitions

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun plural The homeless idlers of Naples who live by chance work or begging; -- so called from the Hospital of St. Lazarus, which serves as their refuge.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • It is a recruiting ground for thieves and criminals of all sorts, living off the garbage of society, people without a definite trace, vagabonds, gens sans feu et sans aveu, varying according to the cultural level of their particular nation, never able to repudiate their lazzaroni character....

    Archive 2009-03-01 Daniel Little 2009

  • It is a recruiting ground for thieves and criminals of all sorts, living off the garbage of society, people without a definite trace, vagabonds, gens sans feu et sans aveu, varying according to the cultural level of their particular nation, never able to repudiate their lazzaroni character....

    eighteen forty-eight Daniel Little 2009

  • One of the earliest pizza sightings was made by the author of The Three Musketeers, Alexandre Dumas père, who visited Naples in the 1830s and observed the lazzaroni eating pizza—largely because it was much cheaper even than maccheroni.

    Delizia! John Dickie 2008

  • There were three days of street fighting before the capo-lazzaro, a man known as Michele il Pazzo “Mad Mike”, was captured; he was treated with great honor by the French general, who wrote in his report that, “the lazzaroni, these astonishing men, are heroes.”

    Delizia! John Dickie 2008

  • I do not know whether Naples does not surpass London for the insolence of the people; for here the lazzaroni have their own general or chief, who receives twenty-five silver ducats from the King every month, solely for the purpose of keeping them in order.

    Delizia! John Dickie 2008

  • “The lazzaroni, these astonishing men, are heroes”: translated from A.

    Delizia! John Dickie 2008

  • A French aristocrat in exile who also had access to the Bourbon court would later claim, The King is the protector of the lazzaroni so that they, in turn, protect him, because they make the government tremble.

    Delizia! John Dickie 2008

  • Ragged lazzaroni lie asleep in doorways, archways, and kennels; the gentry, gaily dressed, are dashing up and down in carriages on the Chiaji, or walking in the Public Gardens; and quiet letter-writers, perched behind their little desks and inkstands under the Portico of the Great Theatre of San Carlo, in the public street, are waiting for clients.

    Pictures from Italy 2007

  • You might have thought of a Neapolitan palace and the groups of lazzaroni about it.

    The Magic Skin 2007

  • French watering-place — especially since our last visit to Naples within these twelvemonths, when we found only four conditions of men remaining in the whole city: to wit, lazzaroni, priests, spies, and soldiers, and all of them beggars; the paternal government having banished all its subjects except the rascals.

    Reprinted Pieces 2007

Comments

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  • The crowd is unquiet on pious baloney.

    What starch will stiffen the slack lazzaroni?

    In Rome they were fed

    With circus and bread;

    In Naples they'll sing and eat macaroni.

    April 12, 2015