Mangas


Manges is the name of a social group in the Belle Époque era's counterculture of Greece. The nearest English equivalent to the term "mangas" is wide boy, or spiv.
Mangas was a label for men belonging to the working class, behaving in a particularly arrogant/presumptuous way, and dressing with a very typical vesture composed of a woolen hat, a jacket, a tight belt, stripe pants, and pointy shoes. Other features of their appearance were their long moustache, their bead chaplets, and their idiosyncratic manneristic limp-walking. A related social group were the Koutsavakides ; the two terms are occasionally used interchangeably. Manges are also notable for being closely associated to the history of Rebetiko.

Etymology

The three most probable etymologies of the word Mangas are the following:
The stereotypical character of Manges became a central theme in several Rebetiko songs, such as "Του Βοτανικού ο Μάγκας", "Ε ντε λα μαγκέ ντε Βοτανίκ", "Πού 'σουν μάγκα το Χειμώνα", and "Μάγκας βγήκε για Σεργιάνι".
Karagiozis shadow plays portray a recurrent character called Stavrakas, Σταύρακας.
In modern Greek language, mangas has become a synonym for "swash guy, swagger" or simply "dude"; depending on context it may have more negative or more positive connotations.