The term "button"

[B.]

I'd seen that but didn't realize it was Bompensiero. Excellent.

[PolackTony]

I'd seen that but didn't realize it was Bompensiero. Excellent.

Yeah and it makes sense once you know it’s Bomp, as the LA membership was small enough to have the entire Family assemble for ceremonies and casting direct votes in a trial.

[PolackTony]

Discussion of casual vs formal nomenclature came up recently on the Milwaukee thread, where B noted that while Maniaci and other informants referred to the Milwaukee as the “outfit” in their accounts to the FBI, a bugged meeting of Milwaukee’s Seggia (Council) in 1964 captured them using terms like “Famiglia”, “borgata”, “mafia”, and “cosa nostra”.

Here’s a 1963 bug of a conversation between Tony and Billy Giacalone in Detroit, where they use “outfit” along with “borgata” and “amici nostri”. Also worth noting that they seem to put Detroit’s membership at this time at around 80 men.

[B.]

80 sounds like a good number for them.

Syrian Detroit associate Charles Monazym told an FBI source that the Detroit "Mafia" had over 100 members and that there were around 1500 total members divided between the Families in NYC. Monazym also told the source that Rubino and Giacalone were "caporegimas" and that there were other Detroit "caporegimas" he didn't name and that they typically had six or seven members under them. He also said Joe Bommarito was an "arbitrator" rather than a captain -- note that a St. Louis source said that certain elders in their Family were "arbitrators", this may be the same STL source who identified the "council table".

Another Syrian associate in Detroit, Phil Peters, told a source that Tony Zerilli was their "boss" and that he was a "caporegima" in the "outfit". The Syrians were clearly well-schooled on the organization in Detroit. Like I've mentioned before, Jimmy Michaels in STL went from being at war with the local Family to being a high-placed associate and partner of the boss, so Detroit and STL both welcomed Syrians into the circle even though they couldn't be made.

[PolackTony]

During his testimony at the 1908 murder trial of Rocco Racco, Hillsville quarry laborer Carmine Esposito told of his induction into the local Calabrian Camorra or “L’Unurata Sucità” under Giuseppe Cutrone and Ferdinando Surace. After swearing an oath on a collection of knives and razors, Esposito said that he was told that he was a member and that he “had to go under the buckle of Surace”.

Could be coincidence, but “going under the buckle” could be cognate to “belonging to the button”. Back in the day, “bottone” would have denoted a brass or other metal fastener, thus very similar to a buckle. Would need to know what the original Italian or Calabrisi word that Esposito would’ve used of course.

Another good one. That's how I interpreted Allegra's use of bottone, that it was akin to being "buttoned down" within Cosa Nostra. Similar to "under the buckle" or "buckled down". Too bad they didn't use the term buckleman.

I imagine there were phrases like this in Italian culture in general just like we see in the English language.

We can shed some more light on the Hillsville reference here about “going under a guy’s buckle”.

From the 1920s to 1950s (when “‘Ndrangheta” first came into documented use as a name for the Calabrian Honored Society), several pentitti in Calabria denoted their organization as “La Fibbia” or “Onorata Società di Fibbia”. Fibbia means, literally, “buckle”, so the use of “buckle” for Esposito’s testimony in 1908 would presumably have been a direct translation of Fibbia.

In 1994, ‘Ndrangheta pentitto Francesco Fonti, initiated into the Honored Society in 1966 in Siderno, testified about the organization. Of note here, Fonti stated in his testimony that members denoted as “Camorristi di Fibbia”, a sub-degree of Camorrista, had the authority to “convene and preside over a meeting in which new members are affiliated” (translated from Italian). Going back to Hillsville, I think it’s evident that Carmine Esposito was inducted as an affiliate of the Minor Society under the authority/sponsorship of Ferdinando Surace, as Surace presumably was a Camorrista given the authority to induct neophytes into the Society. I’ve seen other older Calabrian accounts that claimed that Picciotti in the Minor Society were assigned to specific Camorristi in the Major Society (sort of like that Camorrista’s “crew”, it seems to me) for the commission of crimes. I’d think this was referred to as being “under a guy’s buckle”, or a synonymous phrase.