guinea, adj. — Green’s Dictionary of Slang

guinea adj.

also ginney, ghinny

(US) used to describe an Italian person or culture.

1905		Minneapolis Jrnl (MN) 29 Mar. 11/4: It ain’t me strong for the guinny game, but we had to have Dominick. He was the only one of us who could parley-voo the Eyetaliano. That’s why they sing it in the dago.
1916		J. Lait ‘Annye’s Ma’ in Beef, Iron and Wine (1917) 271: Any business that can use on even terms a Guinea singer and a Guinea pig is, shall be, must be, a chimera.
1930		J. Lait Gangster Girl 44: If a hoodlum shoots his jane or a pineapple is flung in a guinea barber shop...
1931		D. Runyon ‘Lillian’ in Guys and Dolls (1956) 238: A tough Ginney bootlegger by the name of Gregorio.
1943		H.A. Smith Life in a Putty Knife Factory (1948) 54: Good-bye, you guinea gangster!
1955		R. Graziano Somebody Up There Likes Me (1956) 187: Guys, who just plain liked me and didn’t [...] call me Guinea bastard.
1969		M. Puzo Godfather 20: Connie had consented to a ‘guinea’ wedding to please her father.
1973		G.V. Higgins Digger’s Game (1981) 15: I could’ve also called the ghinny Pope.
1975		E. Torres Carlito’s Way 56: Guinea motherfucker.
1977		(con. 1949) J.G. Dunne True Confessions (1979) 28: A funny suicide in North Hollywood. A ginney hit in Silver Lake.
1979		E. Torres After Hours 5: He would stand in the ghinny corner of the yard.
1981		G.V. Higgins Rat on Fire (1982) 32: The guinea son of a bitch gives him a job doing magic tricks with the books at his three restaurants.
1999		E. Bunker Mr Blue 285: Everyone to him was either a nigger, a spic, a greaseball wop, a kike, a Jap, a king-worshipping English sonofabitch, a guinea bastard or a fuckin’ Protestant.
2007		C. Goffard Snitch Jacket 17: ‘You been stink-eyin’ me!’ ‘Well, maybe I hate you, you greasy guinea fuck!’.
2010		Codella and Bennett Alphaville (2011) 41: I see your motherficking guinea faces!
2017		D. Winslow The Force [ebook] ‘I’ll cut his guinea throat’.
2020		(con. 1991-94) W. Boyle City of Margins 10: [A] match made in guinea heaven.

In compounds

guinea football (n.) [i.e. the popularity of fireworks in the Italian community]

(US) a large firecracker; a home-made bomb.

1928		Rocky Mountain News (Denver) 13 Nov. in AS III:3 255/2: Guinea football – Bomb.
1950		Goldin et al. DAUL 87/2: Guinea football. A crudely made bomb, specially a time-bomb.
1979		Maledicta III:2 164: guinea footballn Large firecracker or hand grenade [...] Guinea was orginally applied to Negroes from the African Guinea coast; in the 1880s it was applied to Italians.

guinea red (n.) [SE red (wine); the making of wine by Italian immigrants (and their descendants)]

(US) cheap red wine, poss. homemade.

1933		N. West ‘Miss Lonelyhearts’ in Coll. Works (1975) 264: The first thing she put on the table was a quart bottle of guinea red.
1952		(con. 1920s) ‘Harry Grey’ Hoods (1953) 130: You mean ordinary red wine [...] We still call it Guinea red.
1979		Maledicta III:2 164: guinea redn (DAS 1900] Cheap red wine, especially Chianti.
1987		R. Campbell Alice in La-La Land (1999) 179: What’s the matter? You think I can’t talk? [...] I ain’t a pair of shoes or a jug of guinea red.
2003		N. Green Angel of Montague Street (2004) 34: I’m gonna be sitting in traffic while he’s swilling guinea red.

guinea stinker (n.) [stinker n.¹ (5)]

(also guinea stinker cigar) a cheap, malodorous cigar supposedly preferred by Italian-Americans.

1948		H. Robins Never Love a Stranger (2010) 187: My foreman, who was smoking a Guinea stinker, watched me closely.
1966		(con. 1958) R. Farina Been Down So Long (1972) 288: Here, have a guinea stinker.
1975		E. Torres Carlito’s Way 191: Two old guys [...] puffing on guinea stinkers.
1985		D. Hamill Machine 80: He would sit at the stone checker tables with the old men and smoke the twisted Guinea Stinker cigars.
1998		D. Delillo Underworld 759: The shreddings of a crumbled DeNobili cigar, the perennial guinea stinker.
2002		R/ Cranny Faces along the Bar 68: Raguso had whispered that the cigar was no guinea stinker. It had to cost a couple of bucks at least.

guinea tee (n.) (also guinea T)

(US) a singlet, supposedly stereotypically worn by working-cvlass Italian men.

1976		Philadelphia Dly News (PA) 1 Oct. 9/1: Rizzo, 14 [...] said he saw a man he has identified as Kallinger removed [sic] his coat and shirt to reveal a ‘guinea T.’ The courtroom broke up and the boy was asked, ‘What’s a “guinea T”?’ ‘It’s one of those shirts with no sleeves,’ Rizzo said.
2018		(con. 1970s) T. Pluck in Twitter 26 May 🌐 Growing up in an Italian-American majority town, they called it a "guinea tee." I say tank top. Gender neutral.
2018		(con. 1980s) B. Dreyer in Twitter 26 May 🌐 I call undershirts or sleeveless T’s, but whatever it takes. I heard guinea T regularly growing up on Long Island.

guinea town (n.)

(US) the Italian area of a city.

1938		J. Fante Wait Until Spring Bandini (2007) 33: This dago girl, daughter of a wop coal miner who worked in that guinea-town Louisville.
1963		in T.I. Rubin Sweet Daddy 15: Guinea town, you know, wop town – pig town East Side.
2002		J.R. Mori Into the Heart of the Sea 29: Cherry Street is a somewhat kinder name for the town’s Italian community that is still referred to by many as ‘Guinea Town’ .
2007		B.L. Palmer Leper Factory 223: Oh you going to be living in Guinea Town with the rest of the Wops.