Word.ws English Dictionary

underboss

underboss noun: an assistant to the boss of a crime family.

Noun

underboss (plural underbosses)

  1. An assistant to the boss of a crime family
    • An alleged "underboss" of the Bonanno family, Carmine Galante, has been sentenced to 20 years in prison […]1965 January 6, Peter Kihss, “1,500 in 5 Crime 'Families' Identified”, in New York Times

Forms of underboss

pluralunderbosses

Origin of underboss

From under- + boss, calque from Italian sotto capo.

Questions about underboss

What does underboss mean?
Underboss means an assistant to the boss of a crime family.
What part of speech is underboss?
Underboss is a noun.
What is the plural of underboss?
The plural of underboss is underbosses.

Words near underboss in the dictionary

  1. underboosted
  2. underboosting
  3. underboosts
  4. underbore
  5. underborne
  6. underboss
  7. underbosses
  8. underbottom
  9. underbottoms
  10. underbought
  11. underbound

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: underboss (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-underboss.wav.

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