The word for a reckless young person who leads a wild, free and unruly life is scavezzacollo in Italian. Three possible translations in English include daredevil, risk-taker and tearaway.
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It is composed of two words: scavezzare, a single verb that means to break the top off a tree or more generally to break, and collo which means neck. In other words, it literally translates as something along the lines of neck-breaker!
Note: When used to talk about a female, the word final o does not change to a. This is because scavezzacollo is an invariable noun. In the plural, it becomes scavezzacolli for both sexes.
Quella scavezzacollo di mia sorella va a fare paracadutismo domani.
My daredevil of a sister is going skydiving tomorrow.
Here are respective definite and indefinite articles that should be used with this noun:
- lo scavezzacollo / la scavezzacollo = the daredevil
- uno scavezzacollo / una scavezzacollo = a daredevil
- gli scavezzacolli / le scavezzacolli = the daredevils
- (degli) scavezzacolli / (delle) scavezzacolli = (some) daredevils
A much rarer translation for scavezzacollo appears in the adverbial phrase a scavezzacollo which means at breakneck speed.
Some synonyms for scavezzacollo are rompicollo and scapestrato.
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Heather Broster is a graduate with honours in linguistics from the University of Western Ontario. She is an aspiring polyglot, proficient in English and Italian, as well as Japanese, Welsh, and French to varying degrees of fluency. Originally from Toronto, Heather has resided in various countries, notably Italy for a period of six years. Her primary focus lies in the fields of language acquisition, education, and bilingual instruction.
