Kabenzotz, the Basque buzzword.

Kabenzotz has become an icon thanks to the series and films that talk about Basque topics in a humorous way.

It all started on March 14, 2014 with the premiere of “8 apellidos vascos”, one of the most watched movies in history that grossed more than 38,000,000 euros at the box office, a premiere that marked a before and after in Spanish-language comedies. From “8 apellidos vascos”, the movie, to “Allí abajo”, the series, many Basque words have been used to create a more Basque, more Basque, more authentic atmosphere. These highly successful productions have brought our language, the Basque language, to practically every house in Spain. This is how it awakens the curiosity of many of you, who, after hearing so many words in our language, ask us about them in our article on basic words in Basque. This is the case of the fashionable word, Kabenzotz.

It is a popular expression from the Basque Country, Euskal Herria. A word, which is sometimes used to replace the bad-sounding “Me cago en dios” (I shit on God). In its written form it is easy to find it with variations of all kinds, since it is not governed by any norm of euskaltzaindia (Royal Academy of the Basque Language) or any other organism:

Kabenzotz as a substitute for “Me cago en dios”: This is, perhaps, the most used popular meaning, its generic use would be something like, “me cago en dios”. If we make a morphological analysis of the word, we could separate it into two parts: kauen-caguen and zotz-txox. As far as the first part is concerned, it is easy to understand its meaning, the second part, zotz, means “stick” in Basque, so it is difficult to find a meaning for it. As you can see, since it is a popular expression, its origin is not clear. In these cases, the best thing to do is to write to the experts in the field, euskaltzaindia.

Kabenzotz as a derivative of “cago en sos”: Kabenzotz could well be a derivative of “cagoen en sos”, an expression that was used in the past to shit on the Catholic king without raising “suspicion”. This expression was born in the village sos of the Catholic king, Aragon, very close to Navarra, Euskal Herria.

As you can see, the origins of Kabenzotz are different but the meaning is quite similar. A meaning that proves that Kabenzotz is a popular expression used at times when we have a somewhat “elevated” mood. If you want to see the actor Gorka Aginalde, Koldo in “Allí Abajo’ explaining the meaning of the expression you can see it in the following video.

We hope that this small article about“kabenzotz” will clear up your doubts about the meaning of this Basque word.