# Cornicello

**Cornetto*; the Neapolitan horn*

**Known today as.** A small horn, most often of coral, but also of gold, silver, mother-of-pearl, amber, or lava.

Kind: Amulet

## What was it used for?

Worn on the watch-chain or about the neck, and hung in houses, in Naples and Sicily against the *malocchio*, the evil eye.

## What does modern science say?

Elworthy found it in 1895 “almost invariable upon man and beast in Italy.”

## What lore surrounds it?

It joins two old protections: the horn, which Elworthy found “of all objects the most common as amulets against the evil eye,” and coral, which Pliny says was hung at the necks of infants as a preservative against danger.

In Sicily, Giuseppe Pitrè recorded in 1889, men and women wore little coral horns on their watch-chains and tied them on the necks of newborn babies, and the most determined bound red ribbon to the horns to multiply their force. In Naples Elworthy found horns “as common as blackberries, upon the trappings of horses.”

## What did the older authorities say?

**The Roman *fascinum*.** Pliny calls the god Fascinus the guardian “not of infants only, but of generals as well,” his image “attached beneath the triumphant car of the victorious general”; Elworthy describes the phallic *fascinum* “commonly suspended from the necks” of Roman children, and the gesture of the horns, the *mano cornuta*, as “constant and persistent” against the evil eye.

**Frederick Elworthy.** In *The Evil Eye* (1895) describes the single pendent horn, “of silver, coral, pearl, or bone,” and the Neapolitan cart harness “literally made up of charms and prophylactics,” the horn hung on it among crescents, wolf skin, and bright ribbons.

**The Catholic Encyclopedia.** The Catholic Encyclopedia counts among vain observances “amulets, things worn as a remedy or preservative against evils or mischief, such as diseases or witchcraft,” and says that “the power of the evil eye (fascinatio) has been believed in for a long time, and is still dreaded in many countries.” Pliny records the Roman habit of spitting against it: “we are in the habit of spitting, for instance, as a preservative from epilepsy, or in other words, we repel contagion thereby: in a similar manner, too, we repel fascinations.”

## Sources

- Elworthy, F. T. (1895). *The Evil Eye*. London: John Murray.
- Elworthy, F. T. (1895). *The Evil Eye*, ch. 9.
- Pitrè, G. (1889). *Usi e costumi, credenze e pregiudizi del popolo siciliano*.
- *The Catholic Encyclopedia* (New York, 1907–1914), “Superstition.” newadvent.org/cathen/14339a.htm
- Pliny the Elder, *Natural History* 28.7, trans. J. Bostock & H. T. Riley (1855), Perseus Digital Library.

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*Cornicello.* In *Materia Medica*, edited by B. C. P. Statema. Version 1, revised 2026-10-03. The Thinking Press. https://thethinkingpress.org/materia-medica/cornicello

Historical description, not medical advice.