All This Is That: Middle Finger of the day No. 7 - starring Vito Spatafore, Carmen Diaz, Al Pacino, and more

By Mona Goldwater and Pablo Fanque
Folkways Correspondents

Vito Spatafore from The Sopranos - click to enlarge

Charlize Theron - click to enlarge

Desmond Morris writes in Gestures: Their Origins and Distribution that the "infamous or indecent finger" is mentioned several times in Ancient Roman literature. . .including Martial: "Laugh loudly, Sextillus, when someone calls you a queen and put your middle finger out. . .but you are no sodomite nor fornicator either, Sextillus, nor is Vetustina's hot mouth your fancy." Suetonius, writing about Augustus Caesar, says the emperor "expelled [the entertainer] Pylades . . . because when a spectator started to hiss, he called the attention of the whole audience to him with an obscene movement of his middle finger." Interestingly, most people seem to believe the finger originated sometime in the 20th century.

Morris also that claims Caligula, as an insult, would extend his middle finger for supplicants to kiss. We've read Suetonius too, and, actually, it wasn't just his middle finger Little Boots proffered for kissing.