villano

/biˈʝano/ · B1 · adj

villainous, rude, bad-mannered

🌾 villano = villa + -ano: farmhand on an estate who later became the villain

From Latin villanus, a worker on a villa, which was a country estate. Snobbish nobles called peasants rude and low-born, so the word slid from peasant to bad-mannered to villain. English villain comes from the same root.

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