chutzpah

English

WOTD – 23 June 2008

Alternative forms

• hutzpah, khutzpah, khutspah, chutspa, chutspah, chutzpa, khutspe

Etymology

Originated 1890–95 from Yiddish חוצפּה (khutspe), from Mishnaic Hebrew חוֹצְפָּה (ḥôṣǝpâ) (Sotah 9:15 in MSS Kaufmann A50), from חָצַף (ḥāṣap̄, “to be insolent”). Ultimately from Aramaic חֲצִיפָא (ḥăṣîp̄āʾ), חֲצַף (ḥăṣap̄, “to be barefaced, insolent”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈxʊts.pɑ/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

Noun

chutzpah (usually uncountable, plural chutzpahs)

1. (informal) Nearly arrogant courage; utter audacity, effrontery or impudence; supreme self-confidence; exaggerated self-opinion.

   Synonyms: balls, cheek, gall, nerve, boldness, audacity, insolence

   • 2007 January 22, Philip Howard, “Modern Manners”, in The Times‎^[1]:

     If the service is rotten and the meal a disaster, we should withhold a tip and explain why we are doing so. Few of us have the chutzpah to do this.

   • 2007 December 11, John Scalzi, “Your Creation Museum Report”, in Whatever‎^[2]:

     But seriously, the ability to just come out and put on a placard that the Jurassic era is temporally contiguous with the Fifth Dynasty of the Old Kingdom of Egypt — well, there’s a word for that, and that word is chutzpah.

   • 2015, Tim Carvell [et al.], “Daily Fantasy Sports”, in Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, season 2, episode 34, John Oliver (actor), Warner Bros. Television, via HBO:

     Okay, okay, okay… First of all, “shutspah” is actually pronounced “khootspah”. But, but-but-but the idea, the idea that daily fantasy sites are using this law to claim they’re not gambling is not chutzpah, it’s khorseshit!

Related terms

• chutzpadik (adjective)

Translations

nearly arrogant courage

• Bulgarian: безсрамие (bg) n (bezsramie), нахалство (bg) n (nahalstvo)
• Czech: voprsklost f, chucpe (cs), drzost (cs) f
• Dutch: gotspe (nl) f
• Esperanto: aŭdaco
• Finnish: kantti (fi)
• French: audace (fr) f, culot (fr) m, toupet (fr) m
• Galician: atrevemento (gl) m
• German: Chuzpe (de) f
• Greek: μαγκιά (el) f (magkiá)
• Hebrew: חוצפה f (khutspá)
• Hungarian: hücpe (hu)
• Icelandic: óskammfeilni f
• Italian: sfacciataggine (it) f
• Macedonian: одважност f (odvažnost), дрскост f (drskost)
• Neapolitan: cazzimma
• Polish: bezczelność (pl) f, kpina (pl) f, hucpa (pl) f
• Portuguese: atrevimento (pt) m, lata (pt), topete (pt) m
• Romanian: țâfnă (ro) f, tupeu (ro) n
• Russian: ху́цпа (ru) f (xúcpa), на́глость (ru) f (náglostʹ), наха́льство (ru) n (naxálʹstvo), ха́мство (ru) n (xámstvo), де́рзость (ru) f (dérzostʹ)
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: дрскост f, дрчност f

  Roman: drskost (sh) f, drčnost (sh) f

• Spanish: desfachatez (es) f
• Swedish: fräckhet (sv)
• Ukrainian: ху́цпа f (xúcpa)
• Yiddish: חוצפּה f (khutspe)

See also

• cheek (noun), cheekiness (noun), cheeky (adjective), immortal rind (noun)

References

• “chutzpah”, in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 4th edition, Boston, Mass.: Houghton Mifflin, 2000, →ISBN.
• “chutzpah”, in Dictionary.com Unabridged, Dictionary.com, LLC, 1995–present.
• "chutzpah" in WordNet 2.0, Princeton University, 2003.

Further reading

• chutzpah on Wikipedia.Wikipedia