דֶמִיקוּלוֹ

The word "דֶמִיקוּלוֹ" (demikulo) came to Israeli Hebrew from Ladino (Judeo-Spanish), which was the language of Sephardic Jews who were expelled from Spain in 1492 and settled mainly in regions of the Ottoman Empire. The word is actually a Ladino expression whose literal meaning is "from my ass," and it is composed of three Latin words that were preserved in Spanish and Ladino: "דֶה" (de, a preposition meaning "from" or "of"), "מִי" (mi, first person singular possessive, "my"), and "קוּלוֹ" (culo, "ass"). The Latin word cūlus ("ass") was a vulgar word, and in Ladino the phrase "דֶה מִי קוּלוֹ" (de mi culo) was used as an expression of contempt or rejection, something similar to "from my ass" in English. When the expression reached Israeli Hebrew, it was received as a single word - "דֶמִיקוּלוֹ" (demikulo) - and became an adjective that describes something bad, inferior, or worthless. This is an example of how expressions from Ladino influenced spoken Hebrew in Israel, especially among Jewish communities originating from the Balkans, Greece, and Turkey.