Lunfardo originated as a criminal jargon at the end of the 19th century in Buenos Aires and its arrabales [“outskirts”]. At first, it was spoken by thieves, procurers and fraudsters as a code language used to make communications unintelligible to others, but soon lunfardo spread to tango lyrics and finally to all social classes. That outlaw origin explains the variety of synonyms that lunfardo has for criminal activities and characters (and also the very name given to the jargon: the word “lunfardo” means “thief”).
Lunfardo was the linguistic result of the cultural mixing created by the European immigration, so its terms mostly have its roots in European languages (dialects of Italian, Spanish and French), but also some lunfardo words come from African and South American aboriginal languages (Quechua, Guaraní). It is not a language itself, because lunfardo follows the Spanish grammar and syntax, but its “dictionary” became so extensive that allowed an entire poetry and literature.
It was banned in 1943 by the military dictatorship, that’s why many tango lyrics underwent ridiculous alterations until lunfardo was again permitted in 1947.
Nowadays lunfardo is part of the colloquial language of Buenos Aires and other cities of Argentina. Through the years, some of its terms have fallen into disuse, but many of them are still used with the same meaning they had more than one hundred years ago.
These are some lunfardo words you can hear in the streets and cafés of Buenos Aires:
Afanar v.t. to steal
Apoliyar v.i. to sleep
Bardo n. mess, confusion, muddle. Hacer ~ to make trouble, to provoke
Bife n. slap, punch
Bondi n. streetcar; bus
Cana n. police; prison. Mandar en ~ to denounce, to inform on
Chamuyar v.t. to convince; to speak loquaciously to achieve something; to deceive; to seduce
Chanta adj. deceitful, unreliable
Deschavar(se) v.t. to denounce; to give away
Escabiar v.i. to drink (alcohol)
Laburar v.i. to work
Mina n. woman
Orto n. (vulg.) butt. Tener ~ to be lucky
Quilombo n. originally “brothel”, also “mess”
Rati (vesre –reversing the order of syllables within a word– of Tira) n. policeman
