Il Becco Giallo cartoon 'Tombola!' on the Matteotti murder, Rome, 1925
Cartoon of caricatured men playing tombola (Italian bingo) round a table, one holding up a card. The printed lines give De Bono the call '47, the dead man who speaks' and Mussolini the shout 'Tombola!'. The gambling frame and the lottery slang for a corpse label named officials as players in the murder, by insinuation rather than by any evidence shown in the image.
- Date
- 1925
- Period
- Interwar
- Made by
- Il Becco Giallo (satirical weekly, Rome); cartoonist credited on Commons to Gabriele Galantara
- Country
- Fascist Italy
- Medium
- Cartoon
- Issuer type
- Media
- Regime
- Fascist Italy
- Leader
- Benito Mussolini
- Audience
- Domestic public
- Purpose
- Persuade or win support
- Event
- Matteotti Crisis
- Techniques
- Name-calling
- Leader
- Benito Mussolini
- Source
- Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- Source
- Wikimedia Commons (reproduced from Del Buono and Tornabuoni, Il Becco Giallo, Feltrinelli, 1972), retrieved October 2, 2026
- Rights
- Public domain (Italian weekly published 1925, before 1931; Commons PD-old; reproduction of a 2D work)
Il Becco Giallo, Rome, 1925; artist credited on Commons to Gabriele Galantara (d. 1937). Via Wikimedia Commons.
Text on the object
De Bono: — 47 morto che parla. Mussolini: — Tombola! (Da Il becco giallo) [signature at lower left of the drawing: illegible]
De Bono: — 47, the dead man who speaks. Mussolini: — Bingo! (From Il Becco Giallo) [signature at lower left of the drawing: illegible]
The credit line '(Da Il becco giallo)' was added in the 1972 book reproduction, not in the original weekly. 'Tombola' is the Italian game of bingo and also the call for a full card.
