#1469 #S886 - Cornuto, Seattle - 6/11/2011

"Cornuto" means the "the horns," I was informed, but if you look it up, it also means "cuckold," and is "perhaps the worst insult you can give an Italian man."  I'm not sure what it is doing on a Neapolitan-style pizza place from the Via Tribunali folks (it was to be called "Pizzeria Napolitano" at one time).  But it's a nice place with good pizza, a tiny patio, big open window on warm days, and an oven made from volcanic rock from Mt. Versuvius.

I believe I was actually the first customer for this place.  I was in the neighborhood on this day, and stuck my head in when I noticed the door open.  They told me they opened at 4:00, and when I came back at 4:12 I was the only customer there.  (I only had drinks, not any pizza, on this particular trip.)

A bit more on "cornuto":  "It was an ancient custom to cut the spurs off castrated cocks and graft them to the birds' heads, where they grew as horns. Since the horned capon was a strutting definition of sexual inadequacy, its horns became a symbol of cuckoldry. The sign of the horns, he said, should not be confused with the somewhat similar gesture of defense against the evil eye (index and little finger pointing parallel)"  (Time)


7404 Greenwood Ave, Seattle, WA 98103 -
Est. 6/11/2011 - Building constructed: 1910
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